


Tombraider

by Allganne, SeoMad (Allganne)



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Enemies to Lovers, Lovers To Enemies, M/M, Magic, Slow Burn, Spies & Secret Agents, action movie violence, tombraider au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2020-03-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:08:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21559105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allganne/pseuds/Allganne, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allganne/pseuds/SeoMad
Summary: Taeyong is used to the magical underbelly of the archaeological world being particularly irritating, but when a key he finds on a recent trip results in a long-lost familiar face quite literally invading his home, he quickly realises there is a lot more at work than just a rabbity new PHD candidate being snotty about his new find.
Relationships: Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul | Ten/Qian Kun, Dong Si Cheng | WinWin/Nakamoto Yuta, Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun/Suh Youngho | Johnny, Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung/Lee Taeyong, Kim Jungwoo/Moon Taeil
Comments: 21
Kudos: 81





	1. PROLOGUE

**Author's Note:**

> This has been a long time coming, and its just driving me nuts in my WIP folder so I figured I'd start posting it for my birthday and get my ass in gear.  
> I hope you enjoy! 
> 
> AN: While a lot of this is based on real history, i took the licence of literally every action movie ever and just destroyed it completely. I've probably put more research into this fic than I have literally anything else and yet it's all been bastardised and i'm Sorry.

**PROLOGUE  
** _ Chitwan National Park, Nepal _ ****

Ancient booby traps, Taeyong has decided, are his  _ least _ favourite thing. 

His ass is numb, and his thighs are burning from the pressure of holding himself halfway up the wall as he waits for the third row of circulating spears to finish. 

“I really wish we had a better way of checking for these things,” he whines into his headset to the sound of Johnny chuckling from their base camp outside the temple, and Hyuckie from his workstation all the way back home in Cheshire. 

“Come off it, hyung, this is the fun part.”

“It is  _ not _ . Almost getting speared every ten metres is not fun.”

“Well maybe if you stopped staring at everything you see, things would go faster, and you would almost get speared less often.”

“I am not going to apologise for looking at architecture no one has seen for a thousand years, Johnny,” he says and ignores the second round of laughter from his team. 

He counts the tenth and final rotation of spears and listens for the gentle grinding click as they settle again before he drops down, groaning as he rubs at his aching legs for a moment and stretches out his back. 

“So, any idea what we’ve got in the next room?” he asks as he makes his way to the door. 

Its an enormous stone wall of carved figureheads surrounding two large entwined trees, this time her branches in full bloom. 

“From the scanner it a pretty standard bolt lock just like the others, so it’s your turn to have fun with the puzzle lock, hyung.”

Taeyong knows from the smug tone in Donghyuck’s voice that he already knows the order of the bolts to open the door. There is always a lot more to Hyuckie’s technology than first meets the eye and his scanners can definitely work through stone. 

If they didn’t, Taeyong might have  _ definitely _ gotten speared. 

But as easy as this would be if Donghyuck wasn’t a brat and simply told Taeyong the answer, doing it himself is half the fun.

He likes being warned for the booby traps, but he loves the puzzles.

The entire temple has been an homage to the changing seasons so far, and it takes him all of twenty minutes to slide each of the ancient bolts into place, most of it ignoring Johnny’s quips about the size of his biceps. But there truly is no greater sound than the glorious grinding of ancient gears slowly prying open doors that have been locked for centuries. 

The smell, however, is immediate and appalling; a thick smog of dust and decay he can smell even through the filtering mask he’s wearing. But Taeyong has been doing this so long there’s an eerie thrill to that smell. 

It’s the smell of adventure, of revealing ancient mysteries and stepping back into the past. 

“Sending the scanner in,” Hyuckie singsongs over the comms and the tiny little robot scurries under Taeyong’s feet as he stands in the doorway in awe.

“What’s she like?” Johnny asks, sounding a little breathless. 

He’s only a few hundred metres behind Taeyong right now, but they’ve been forced to learn that it’s always best to keep one of them at camp for the initial opening of the tombs. 

Taeyong just usually gets the lucky straw. 

“Oh, she’s beautiful,” Taeyong murmurs, and she is. The room is  _ small _ , much smaller than Taeyong has anticipated, especially given how much effort has been involved to reach it, but it’s little more than an antechamber that is twice as tall as she is wide. 

Taeyong has been making his way through a twisting series of corridors for the last few hours. So far there has been four separate doors between the outside world and where he is standing now, and it has all come to a single room barely larger than the supply transport Jaehyun sent with Johnny for this expedition. 

But what she lacks in size she makes up for in the two intricately carved trees emerging from each far wall like they are part of it. There are the remnants of offerings scattered around the base of each trunk as it disappears into the stone of each wall and the floor. There are glass bottles and the glimmer of gold from several bowls, there are the rotten remnants of cloth bags and food. 

But the real focus of the room is where the branches of the two trees intertwine like two hands grasping desperately for each other, and at the centre of the arch sits a curiosity Taeyong didn’t really expect. 

Not that he expected any of this. 

“Well aren’t you beautiful?” he says as he carefully steps between the offerings so he can kneel down in front of a golden disk, beautifully engraved on the three separate rotational levels and at it’s centre an enormous glowing glass gem. 

“What have we got, Yongie?” Johnny asks, voice cracking with anticipation. 

“Something magical,” Taeyong says, unable to hold back a giggle as he peers down at it. 

“God, I hate you,” Johnny groans and Hyuck is making exaggerated gagging noises but Taeyong ignores them, cocking his head to the side as he peers at something beautiful. 

Something that doesn’t quite belong. 


	2. CHAPTER I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jungwoo needs a favour

**CHAPTER II  
** _Cambridge, England_

** _Six Months Later._ **

“It’s only a few extra crates,” Jungwoo laments and Taeyong closes his eyes, clenching his hands around the wheel of his G63, middle of the road be damned. 

“How many is ‘a few’ _?”_ he asks, gritting his teeth and indicating around a semi-trailer with more speed than is entirely necessary. 

The driver beeps his horn. 

“Like twelve. But you _know_ how much I hate keeping untested artefacts in general storage. Please, hyung?” Jungwoo pleads, adding extra whine to his voice for greater effect. 

“You waited until I was halfway there before springing this on me, didn’t you?” Taeyong asks and he can hear the pride in Woo’s voice when he replies. 

“It’s why Mark has the engine out of the Lamborghini, so you’d have to take out the Merc AMG.” 

“Traitor. I knew there was nothing wrong with the brake pads,” he grits and wrinkles his nose. 

There’s still not enough room in the back of the Mercedes for the amount of boxes Woo wants him to take though. 

“Make sure you have a trailer ready,” he admits and Jungwoo laughs, something trilling, and bright in victory. 

Taeyong likes to think he has a strong resolve, but he had learned a long time ago that there really is no one who can actually stand up to Kim Jungwoo and win. 

His file calls it being a powerful negotiator; though there’s never much of a negotiation between anyone and Woo. 

Whatever Jungwoo wants, Jungwoo gets. 

It's why he's a Curator this young.

It’s fairly busy when Taeyong finally arrives at Cambridge University nearly and hour and a half later. 

There are three large school buses taking up prominent place in the tourist entrance car park and as Taeyong slips past and scans his way through to the secure section of the University, he knows then and there where he needs to go searching for his wayward miscreant. 

It's obvious from the sheer chaos along the transport dock that Jungwoo wasnt over estimating the amount of work going into reworking the archive and he silently forgives him for his mischief. 

Wandering back down to the public area, the wash of tourists and school children almost seem tame compared to the cacophony of transport crates and forklifts rearranging an entire archive. 

The Faculty of Classics in particular is awash with a younger crowd of school children when Taeyong wanders through. 

He waves at Lami where she's sitting in reception and settles underneath the pediments from Zeus’ temple to lie in wait. It doesn’t take long before Jungwoo emerges from the depths of the collection, trying to entertain a herd of small children through the story of Medusa as he does so.

It’s clear that Jungwoo is so occupied he hasn’t noticed Taeyong’s arrival, not that he is too put out about waiting, and so he laughs along happily as Jungwoo pretends to be a statue for far longer than the kids are prepared to endure. Half the pack start shouting at him before Taeyong finally takes out his phone and snaps a picture.

That’s enough to catch Jungwoo’s attention and he flashes Taeyong a smile as several children hang onto him, asking loud questions and stressing out their teachers. 

Jungwoo looks in his element. 

Though he also looks much the same way in the middle of a shootout.

They’re all a little weird like that. 

It doesn’t take Jungwoo long before he slips out of the grasp of his little herd and leaves them in the capable hands of the Cast’s actual tour guides. 

“Having fun?” Taeyong asks as Jungwoo comes to a stop in front of him.

“The most. Thank you, hyung. I really appreciate it. You know I wouldn’t ask unless I had to.”

Taeyong shrugs and pulls himself to his feet. 

"I know. I saw the dock," he grins and Woo makes an exaggerated face, like a Greek mask of Sorrow. 

Jungwoo’s initial call had seemed urgent, at least from his end. It’s why Taeyong is here. He wouldn’t drive all this way for just anyone, and Jungwoo is one of the select few he would move mountains for. 

Housing a few artefacts is nothing compared to that. Even if Jungwoo has nearly tripled the number between Taeyong’s driveway and here.

“It’s not that much of a problem,” he says, and it’s not. 

Security in the vault of the Cambridge Scholars is tight and with new discoveries each year its contents tends to grow. It’s not the only magically protected vault in the in this corner of the globe, but everyone has their specialities and it's not uncommon for artefacts to swap hands (or entire countries) more than once. 

And with maintaining such a tight ship, small allowances need to be made every now and again. 

Taeyong doesn’t even know what Jungwoo wants him to take back to the Estate. In fact, Taeyong doesn’t want to know. 

Curiosity kills more than just cats with the toys they keep here. 

“Is everything ready to go?” he asks as they idly wander back towards the entrance of the Collection.

“I'll have to make sure. I know they were moving a whole bunch of new things out of the lower levels this morning.”

"I saw that," Taeyong laughs and Jungwoo makes a pained sound. 

"It's truly a nightmare, hyung. But they should have everything ready for you. I gave them more than enough warning."

“Is there anything I should be afraid of?” Taeyong grins and Jungwoo shrugs. 

“Not if you leave it alone.” 

Taeyong watches, bemused, as Woo pulls out his phone and starts flipping through what looks like Taeyong’s future manifest. 

“So, am I borrowing a trailer?”

“I’m not sending you home with a _sarcophagus_ , Taeyong,” Woo says, but there’s a small smile playing around the corner of his lips until it drops into a minor frown. 

“Seems like they’re still boxing a few things up so I’m going to go put out the fires. But you should go see Taeil. He mentioned this morning he had something you'd like? I think it’s about your key? Which, speaking of, can be logged out of the archive. Better you have it than it getting lost; last I checked the J’s were re-cataloguing everything cursed from the entire New Kingdom. Speaking of, when I find out who thought it would be a good idea to set those two loose I’m going to take a few ideas out of the book of the Dead _myself_.” 

Taeyong can’t help but laugh at the vibrant annoyance radiating off Jungwoo as the Curator shoves his phone back into his pocket. 

There is a lot Jungwoo is capable of, but keeping Jeno and Jaemin under control is definitely one of his more relative accomplishments. 

That particular skill comes few and far between and despite dealing with the two little hellspawn responsible for at least 3 early retirements, Jungwoo is calm and composed when he types out a quick message and then looks up from his phone to flash Taeyong a smile. 

“It shouldn’t take long to round everything up. I’ll call you when I’m done, hyung,” he promises and Taeyong waves him off. 

Despite his complaints, it's not hard to get out to Cambridge and he generally enjoys being here so long as he avoids anyone higher in the hierarchy than Woo, or maybe Hansol. 

There are plenty of people Taeyong is perfectly happy ignoring, _especially_ amongst the Cambridge Scholars, but Moon Taeil certainly isn’t one of them. 

Taeil just so happens to be one of his favourite people in the entire world. 

Following Jungwoo’s suggestion he heads up towards the private halls where Taeil and the rest of the inducted Cambridge Scholars have their own offices.

It’s been months since he’s been back, but nothing has really changed, nor is he expecting it to. 

In fact, it’s almost entirely plausible that Taeil is still working his way through the same theory he had been when Taeyong had brought his key back in the first place. 

Though even the most plausible theories can be eliminated. 

Taeil is sitting cross legged on the floor when Taeyong lets himself in, the older man surrounded by at least a dozen open volumes of Homer and his two largest star charts. 

It’s a familiar sight, though not quite the one Taeyong had walked in on last time. 

“You know you _have_ a desk,” he calls out as he approaches, knowing Taeil wouldn’t have heard him knocking if he’d been using a church bell. In true form Taeil doesn’t even blink, too used to people just appearing to distract him. 

“It’s not big enough,” Taeil replies, still mostly distracted, and Taeyong knows his hyung hasn’t even finished realising there is someone in the room, let alone who it is. 

“I’m pretty sure you can afford a new one,” Taeyong muses, perching himself on the corner of the Elizabethan antique Taeil should be using and happily starts smearing his fingerprints over the lacquer like a heathen. 

“I don’t think they made anything bigger.”

“Not in England maybe. The Qing dynasty definitely did.”

“If you can find me a Qing dynasty desk with enough hidden drawers to be useful, Taeyong, I promise I will use it,” Taeil hums and finally pulls his attention away. 

“What are you doing here?” he asks and Taeyong snorts setting down the carved bust of Socrates Taeil likes having staring competitions with and turns back to his friend who is still sitting cross-legged on the floor. 

“Came to see Woo. He said you wanted to see me,” he grins and it takes Taeil a moment, his eyebrows pinching adorably as he chases the Greek philosophers out of his brain. 

“Right. I did,” he agrees, unfolding himself and climbing back to his feet with a grace Taeyong knows is beyond everyone else at this university. 

“That key you found in Chitwan I might have something for you.”

“Then what’s with the Homer?”

“I’m picking fights with the French Institute again,” Taeil hums and pushes Taeyong aside so he can get to one of the lower drawers in the enormous tudor-oak writing desk he never uses. 

“Professor Do?”

“No. Byun. He’s compounding theories again and I won’t stand for it.”

Taeil stands up again and hands Taeyong a slip of paper. 

“Kim Dongyoung?” 

“A new transfer. Someone _definitely_ paid to get him in here, but he’s utilising the catalogue. I’ve seen him talk for twenty minutes about an Egyptian cat two thousand years outside his jurisdiction, but he was awfully quiet when I was scanning that key of yours. Had this look on his face. He knows more than he’s telling.” 

Taeyong’s grin is so wide his cheeks hurt. Gods above, he loves Taeil. 

Taeyong has seen Taeil disassemble a semi automatic blindfolded in 27 seconds. Hes seen him count cards and calculate magical radiation blasts off the top of his head, but Taeil also knows _people_. He knows how to read them, how to make them comfortable and how to make them trust him. And there is no one else whose hunches Taeyong trusts more. 

“Will he talk to me?” he asks, quirking an eyebrow at Taeil’s distracted frown. 

“You have the ability to talk to everyone, it’s simply how much real information you get that is the problem. Just _do_ try not to pick a fight with him. He’s bratty. Jinki says Kibum knows his brother and you know exactly what that means.”

That did actually say a lot more than anything else Taeil has said so far, so Taeyong takes it for what it is. Taeil clearly wants him out of his hair, and he’d bet money that if he asked later he won’t even remember Taeyong stopping by. 

“Get some sleep, hyung,” he says, pressing a kiss to Taeil’s cheek and slipping back around him.

“And stop picking fights with Baekhyun!” 

Taeil simply waves him off and when Taeyong glances back a moment Taeil has bent down against his desk to reach Socrates eye level and is sneering at him with a Taeil-only focus that leaves Taeyong giggling as he pulls out his phone and video calls his cousin. 

“Hyung I’m _busy,”_ Donghyuck whines the moment he picks up and Taeyong snorts. 

“Yes, well Hyuckle-puckle, I need you to actually work for me today, so get off Overwatch, will you.”

“I hate it when you call me that. Buy me bubble tea on your way home and I’ll try not to complain too much. So long as this is actually _interesting._ ” 

There are days Taeyong isn’t sure which side of their rather eccentric family Donghyuck gets his temperament from, neither his mother or his aunt was as brash as Donghyuck, but given both their mothers’ attraction towards stupid level IQ’s and finicky attention spans it doesn’t really matter where he got it from; there has never been much hope for any sort of normalcy for them anyway. 

“I need you to dig up whatever you can find about one Kim Dongyoung. Graduate from Seoul Historical Institute. Just transferred in. Got a real big stick up his – “

Donghyuck sniggers. 

“You picked a fight with him didn’t you, hyung?”

“I’ve picked nothing. I haven’t even met him yet.”

Donghyuck snorts and makes a face of disbelief before the sound of his keyboard tapping happily comes through the speaker for a bare moment. 

“Uhhhuh. Right, well he’s easy to find I’ll give him that. He’s got a trail longer than Mark did before we cleaned him up. Baby scholar wants to be noooooticed,” Hyuckie sing-songs with a giddy little grin.

“Okay, what do you want to know?” Hyuck asks after a quiet moment and Taeyong rubs at his eyes as he zones back in, adjusting the grip on his phone.

“Give me the run down. I want cards up my sleeve.”

“Well he’s a boring history nerd, hyung. Pfffft, he's not even obsessed with anything _interesting_."

"Why?" Taeyong asks, listening to Hyuck's keys tapping idly. 

"Eugh, it's all soul mate theory. Blah blah blah, self fulfilling destiny, blah blah free will versus fate. Boring boring boring. Blegh, he has so many opinions about Soul Mates, hyung. You're gonna hate him."

Taeyong smiles at the irritated little scrunch in Hyuck's nose as he digs through his files. Taeyong tries to ignore the little slip and it seems like Donghyuck is too focused to notice anything. 

"It seems like he enjoys sticking his nose in any and every soul mate story across the globe. He’s got the P’anKu right up front. There’s essays about the Mauri and the Sumarians. Currently real big on the Greeks, but who isn’t? Zeus and his lightning bolts cutting us all in half like the asshole he is.”

“Hyuckie,” Taeyong chides and that catches a smile out of Hyuck. 

“No seriously, hyung, he is all over the Greeks at the moment. He has a brother who’s working security down in Naples with Kibum on the Herculaneum excavation project. He’s also got two published essays after they found that city full of hedonism off the coast.”

“He really liked that did he?”

“Who wouldn’t? A city known for its debauchery? in _Greece_? I think this is my favourite thing I’ve found all day. Hyung, why didn’t I know about this before?”

“Because you hate anything that exists without a built-in wifi connection.”

“I mean that’s true; I’d actually die before I went snorkelling but like, I can appreciate cities being swallowed up by the ocean for being too gay. That’s everything to me, hyung.”

“I’ll keep that in mind next time I need to go somewhere.”

“Please do. Mark keeps getting antsy I think he needs to be walked soon, or something. Maybe his Soul Mate likes snorkelling. You should take Mark to Greece.”

“Please behave, Hyuck. So, anything else to know about Mr Soul Mates Have Historical Context?”

“Not really. I mean, he definitely hasn’t found his own? No one getting laid on the reg would be this uptight and even in his essays he’s suuuuper bitter about Soul marks and the moral complexity of self-fulfilling destiny and _blah blah_ , so he’s a definite hypocrite there. He just looks like a boring old nerd who just wants his professors to think he’s smart in a topic that _literally everyone_ knows the basics on. Applies to a whole bunch of journals. Still logs into Facebook for some reason. Tells people on twitter they’re stupid, which is like the only thing I can appreciate so far. His little friend is cute? Awww they went to a concert together. Adorable.” 

“You need more friends.”

“I _need_ bubble tea,” Hyuck replies and Taeyong huffs.

‘I’ll think about it. Keep digging. If we’re lucky this guy might help us win that bingo game against Sehun if I play things right.”

“Insult Greece, that seems like the best course of action. Complain that robbing underwater cities is too tedious, that’ll get him.”

“Ill keep that in mind. Behave, Ducky.”

“Make me,” Hyuck threatens and hangs up. 

*

The thing with spending so much time at the Cambridge Institute of Archaeology is that Taeyong has seen it all. 

He’s spent more hours watching budding historians burn through their brains on caffeine than most university lecturers. He’s familiar with complaints about funding, about honours thesis’, has heard or read almost every single interpretation of any one primary source possible, and has learned to drown out the eternal vendetta against pottery shards. 

At first glance Kim Dongyoung looks completely normal, completely boring. He even has the cardigans and glasses combo that Johnny makes fun of on anyone that’s not Taeil or Jaehyun. 

But he’s pretty, Taeyong acknowledges idly, with his dark hair and wide shoulders. He’s leaning over a stone tablet sneering at it intently like it can reveal the secrets of the universe and that alone makes Taeyong allow himself to like him. 

But it’s nice, sometimes, to see the little history nerds discovering the magical underbelly that most people blatantly ignore. 

Everyone knows about soul mates, but anything more than that is generally classed as children’s stories and delegated to fantasy novels or the insane. 

Seeing the objects that have shaped history and myth for the first time, free of the bullshit of societies perceptions and lies, must really be exhilarating. 

Taeyong sort of hates to interrupt him, he looks cute making faces. 

Still, Taeil had sent him after this little scholar for a reason. 

And there is nothing Taeyong loves more than a good puzzle. 

“So, you’re the new baby scholar on the block, huh?” he asks, leaning in the doorway of the vault and watching as the man stands bolt upright looking surprised. 

He sort of looks a little like a rabbit caught in headlights and Taeyong’s smile only widens. 

Cute. 

“Who are you?” 

“A familiar face around here, that’s all. My name is Lee Taeyong,” he says and watches as the man’s arched eyes narrow to slits and his mouth settles in a sneer. 

Taeyong smirks; oh yes, Taeil was right again, but better than simple intuition Taeil has won one step further. Not only does this man know what Taeyong does, he knows exactly who _Taeyong_ _is_. 

There’s a look that he’s become intimately familiar with. Almost everyone new to the university looks at him the same way: a bitter distrust and disapproval that they all think is revolutionary. 

Tomb Raiders, they call him, or anyone like him. Grave Robbers, mercenaries, destroyers of all that is sacred. 

The conversation had become so exhausting before most of them even start that Taeyong started provoking the adorable little history majors out of boredom alone.

He’s not the only one either. There’s a group chat of a half dozen Tomb Raiders and their teams playing Bingo with prefilled insult cards and the loser has to become published in the backdoor academic equivalent of the Quibbler. 

They really should be ashamed of themselves if it wasn’t so entertaining. 

Making fun of all of the morally-sound archaeologists with their good intentions and bad funding. In a world where Soul Mates are a cornerstone of not only mythology but the very fabric of most committed relationships, more of them really should know the real reasons jobs like his exist. Most of them don’t even take the Tutankhamun curse seriously and that’s usually the one single thing Taeyong has to say to anyone to get paid handsomely _and_ upfront. No university wants to be the next Carter expedition. 

“So, Kim Dongyoung, what does a Seoul Institute transfer think my key has to do with the origins of preter-destiny and soul mates?” 

“How does a Tomb Raider like you have any right to step foot in this university?” Kim Dongyoung snarks in response and Taeyong has to fight not to giggle. 

Sentence one and he could already cross two boxes off his bingo card.

He clears his throat and takes a step further into the room.

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“And I’m not going to.”

“Ach, my entire plan, foiled.”

“You have some nerve coming here asking questions.”

“It’s cute that you think this entire conversation is new to me. But I’m not the one without an access card to the vault, so – “ He lets the card drop from his fingers and hang by the lanyard enticingly. Dongyoung’s eyes fall to it immediately, like a magpie and Taeyong feels a rush of satisfaction.

They really are all the same. 

“That can’t be real,” Dongyoung sneers again, squaring his shoulders and Taeyong sighs. 

“Of course it’s not. I simply wander around whenever I please using dynamite instead of doors. It’s terribly taxing, you know. All the dust is just awful for my allergies.”

“Why are you here?” Dongyoung finally asks with a grimace. 

“Well, Dr Moon was kind enough to tell me you knew something about my little key. I mean, I’d never even _considered_ that it might have something to do with Soul marks. But Taeil was very sure you weren’t saying something, and that’s just awful, not even sharing.”

“I’m not about to go off talking to a Cambridge Scholar like Professor Moon with a half-baked interpretation.” 

“Taeil _is_ half baked most of the time, he loves absurd theories; they’re his _favourite._ It’s why he called me, because he has a theory that you know why a key with clear origins in the Archaeic Greece ended up underneath a mountain in Nepal,” he says, all but ignoring the rookie scholar to pull out a lollypop from his pocket and unwrap it as badly as he possibly can. 

“From what I’ve heard the temple was literally a _shrine_ to the Soul Tree. It’s clearly not _that_ much of a stretch,” Doyoung sneers, his condescension making Taeyong have to fight not to laugh as he carelessly drops tiny bits of plastic on the floor of the vault. 

“Oh, I don’t know, Seoul Institute. Enlighten me,” Taeyong mocks, grinning as he happily pops the lollypop into his mouth and fighting the satisfaction of watching the other man grind his teeth down to the root. 

“How knowledgeable are you of ancient Greek texts?” Dongyoung asks, 

“Eh,” Taeyong shrugs, just to be extra irritating and from how tense the other man’s breathing is it’s clearly working. 

“Right. Well, there is a… theory based on a singular text found in the first excavation of the Villa of the Papyri. Without any real distinction it appeared to be little more than the documentation of an old wives tale.”

“Philodemus was like that. You’re talking about the Story of the Maidentree, yes?” Taeyong says and takes immense pleasure in the look of surprise that flitters across Dongyoung’s face before he draws it back into a scowl again. 

“Yes. For the longest time it’s been only viewed with superstition. There hasn’t been any other reference to a Soul Tree in any viable text at all. It is only ever referenced once, and there's no location to form a basis and look for more, it's just said to be 'growing from the heart of the world.' Even here there's nothing else except that one single text. I've looked. So why was this one documented? Why this myth, this story? And I would have let it go, except, I've had the luck to have access to high retina scans of the pages recovered from the recent excavation of the Villa's lower archives. And I believe that I've found a new text that _also_ references the story of the Tree.”

Doyoung is giddy, his excitement a brilliant almost bubbling thing and Taeyong wants to be excited nwith him. His passion is contagious enough that Taeyong is almost willing to let this go. 

But while Doyoung's interest might be focused on what really could be something exciting in the archaeological world, Taeyong's interest is more focused on that niggling little worry Taeil's hunch has firmly planted. 

Doyoung is passionate and enthusiastic, but the MaidenTree is not enough to get anyone into the Scholars Archive. Doyoung is an anomaly and Taeyong isn't about to let this puzzle go because he's cute.

“And this has what to do with my key?” he asks, fighting a smile as he holds his ground against the contemptuous look of shock coming off the snotty archaeologist. 

“ _Everything_! The story references a meeting held on the day of the highest sun where the priestesses of Athena agreed to take into custody a war chest that contained a key. They agreed to keep the chest until the highest moon where they would travel to the edge of the empire and pass the chest along. It was never to stay in the same place.”

“Still don’t see any connection to my key,” Taeyong says and has to fight not to laugh at the exasperated huff Dongyoung lets out, marching over to where he’s left his tablet and furiously scrolling through his files until he brings up exactly what Taeyong wants and shoves it in his face. 

“Look at this! High resolution scans right out of Naples Translation project! Look here, that chest bears the same markings as your key. Iconography _undocumented anywhere else._ I've spent days going through every record I can find and it hasn't been used or referenced anywhere else. Even your fancy system hasn't found anything. The only time this icon has been used again is in the temple where you found your key. I think this is what was in the chest. I think this could be part of the key referenced in the original story of the Maidentree.”

It really is a beautifully preserved scroll, Taeyong thinks as he looks over the time muddles lines of ancient Greek. There are some of the more curious texts from the Villa kept deeper into the vault and most of them are little more than atoms held together by ash. 

Whatever was in the air in the lower archives of the Villa has kept this one beautiful and it’s almost completely legible without any enhancements. 

Particularly the very clear imagery between two paragraphs further down. A familiar piece of iconography that Taeyong had indeed seen on all four doors leading down to his key. An icon engraved into the convex amber heart of his key. 

He shrugs, just to be extra irritating. 

“A key I found in Nepal. Based on an old wives tale in Greece?”

“Your cynicism does nothing against the propos of archaeology. The world was a much smaller place than it is now. Surely if you cannot see the value in this history and the history of preter-destiny in ancient cultures then you can at least find some interest in its monetary value.”

“What would I know?”

“You should know! The origins of Soul Mates have a historical basis in _every_ major culture in the world! Egypt has the story of Geb and Nut being split from their love embrace. The Maori in New Zealand have Ranguini and Papatuanku. China has P’an-Ku and the separating of Yin and Yang. And everyone knows about Zeus cutting human’s souls in half!”

“Yeah, those are all stories about soulmates being broken up, though,” Taeyong points out, adding emphasis by pointing at Dongyoung with his half-eaten lollypop. 

“Yes! But the _only_ story of reuniting lovers is the Soul tree! Where two lovers found each other again but weren’t permitted to be together and were kept apart by even the Gods. They broke their oaths and reunited with each other in secret–“

“Only to be turned into trees, the Soul Tree of the first two lovers. It’s a nice story, but no one has ever found the tree. Not even in mythos. No one has ever found more than that one text describing it.”

“But now there’s a second text! _And_ you located a key hidden in a temple seemingly dedicated to the Soul Tree!! What if it’s actually real, what if the wives tale was true? What if this key is how you find the actual Soul Tree?”

“Then I’ll be a very rich man,” Taeyong grins and all the excitement disappears off Dongyoung’s face to be replaced by barely contained fury. 

“You’re – you’re _impossible!”_ Dongyoung rages 

“And very busy, unfortunately,” Taeyong muses, shifting around Dongyoung to reach the computer in the corner and letting it scan his biometrics. 

“What are you doing?” Dongyoung asks, brows furrowed deeply and his unforgotten fury curling the corners of his mouth and bringing his shoulders up like an animal. 

Taeyong grins. 

“Taking my baby home,” he shrugs turning back to type in the item code. 

Jungwoo really has done almost all the work for him, it seems, which he appreciates. So all he needs to do is reconfirm his biometrics before the vault starts cycling through to bring the key up to the surface. 

“What?!” 

“Taking her home,” he repeats as Dongyoung peers over his shoulder at the screen where the system is running through Taeyong’s rather impressive security logs to sign out the key. 

“You can’t do that!” Dongyoung blubbers and Taeyong flashes him his best smile and watches as it flusters the young archaeologist. 

“Well the Scholars say differently,” he shrugs, walking over and opening one of the hidden walls to reveal a selection of transport cases and protective gloves. 

“It doesn’t belong to you!”

“Technically it belongs to the Napalese who signed it over to the Council because it’s an ancient artefact putting off latent magical energy. So, it goes where the Council says it goes. Which, at the moment, is home with me," he grins, pulling on the insulated gloves required for working with the unknown artefacts.

Dongyoung splutters again but he doesn’t get in Taeyong’s way as the portal opens and the key is brought to the surface until Taeyong reaches out to pick it up and he steps impulsively between Taeyong and the artefact. 

Taeyong raises an expectant brow at Dongyoung who seems to blush and then after a long moment of empty silence he lets Taeyong push him aside. 

“You’re new here, Rookie. Stick around a while and you might understand things a little better,” he offers. 

Dongyoung scoffs again.

“I’m not sure I want to,” he admits and Taeyong laughs as he finally takes up the key and takes it over to the waiting case, his fingers still tingling with the buzz of something magical despite his gloves. 

Dongyoung’s eyes don’t leave it the entire time as Taeyong locks it away and watches as the transport case air locks and settles. 

“Catch you around, Seoul Institute,” Taeyong says, looking back to where the rookie scholar is staring at the case with a look of consternation Taeyong can’t read, his hands clenched as if he’s stopping himself from reaching out again. 

Cute.

Taeyong lets the door swing shut behind him and his arm tingles again where it’s clenched around the case and he frowns, scrunching his hand into a fist a few times to get the muscles to relax. God, he hates magical artefacts. They’re _always_ boobytrapped. 

Maybe he needs to get the two J’s to take another look at it before he takes it home because he’s not touching it again if it’s going to keep letting off latent charge even through protection. 

And no one else should be going near it either. Dongyoung wasn’t far off with his theories; it’s a weird outlier which means it’s definitely right up NCT’s alley.

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> If you'd like to chat I can be found on twitter and curious cat. 
> 
> [ @CaptainJacq](http://twitter.com/captainJacq)
> 
> [ Curious Cat"](Http://curiouscat.me/CaptainJacq)
> 
> Until next time  
> MWAH  
> xxxx


	3. Chapter II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ten makes a house call.

**II**

When Taeyong gets back to the estate Johnny has music pumping through the built-in speakers in at least three rooms as he slips down the stairs towards the bottom landing. 

The doors to the delivery bay are wide open using one of the antique foot stools to keep them open as Johnny lugs several large crates inside, singing along to his music loudly and happily as he does so. 

“Heya Taeyongie! Look! Jaehyunnie sent me new toys!” he grins the moment he catches sight of Taeyong. Taeyong returns the smile and doesn’t say anything, simply following after the big lug as he walks the path of speakers into the central hub of the house. 

There are already four even bigger crates stacked neatly on top of each other, with Donghyuck perched on the topmost one, staring down at his phone and popping gum.

Taeyong can’t see Mark from the top level of the workshop, but he can hear him dropping spanners somewhere deeper in, no doubt chest deep under one of the buggies. 

“So, how was your pickup?” Johnny asks, setting down one of his crates and searching through the mess of tools and loops of soldering wire for his crowbar. 

“Good,” Taeyong says, setting Johnny’s americano on the workshop table out of harms way and wandering over to hold up Hyuck’s bubble tea for the kid to take. 

“Anything interesting?” Johnny probes and Taeyong grins, 

“Jungwoo wasn’t wrong about them running out of room in the vault. The docking bay was bedlam. But Taeilie had news, about the key we found in Nepal,” he says, pulling himself up onto the workbench to watch Johnny’s arms flex as he pops open the first crate. 

“What’s the odd duck found this time?” Johnny asks as Taeyong admires his friends bulging biceps and the casual glance of his pecs through the low-cut muscle shirt he’s wearing. It’s Taeyong’s favourite shirt and Johnny knows it. 

“A new archaeologist, a baby from out of town who just transferred in. He has a bone to pick.”

“Oh, we usually really like those,” Johnny grins, flashing him a grin and wiggling his eyebrows. 

“We do. He didn’t even blink, Johnny, he just went all in. Thought less of me than the dog shit on his shoes,” Taeyong sighs, remembering the way Kim Dongyoung’s angry pout had looked while he was busy glaring at him. 

Johnny’s resounding cackle makes Mark drop something again further into the workshop. 

“Hyuuuung,” comes his whining complaint that they both ignore in favour of grinning at each other. 

“So, what did you say to piss him off then?”

“He brought up the Maidentree like two minutes in. All I had to do was turn my nose up at it and he was off. He’s got his dick stuck in anything coming out of the Herculaneum excavation same as anyone with a history degree.”

Johnny sniggers.

“ _Somehow_ he has access to the scans coming out of the Naples and Kentucky translation projects though. Taeil said it’s probably Kibum, which just means he’s actually onto something good. Do you know how irritating that is, Johnny? Every Council archaeologist in the northern hemisphere is going to wet their shorts when they find out there’s a second text referencing the Maidentree. I can’t wait for them all to pick fights in the journals. Publishing might just become fun again.”

“Did he do the treasurehunter speech?” Johnny asks, like a kid on Christmas.

“Of course he did. What do you take me for?”

“Yes!” Johnny grins reaching out for an ecstatic high five. “Sehun can fucking suck it! We’re gonna get bingo by August this is _great.”_

*

Doyoung has never been one to count time as it slips by. 

Never felt the painful count of each day passing through. 

However, Doyoung also knows he has been in England for exactly three and a half months.

And that says far more about his stay than any letter he could possibly write home. 

Fourteen weeks to the day since he had stumbled off the plane at Heathrow to find a grinning behemoth with blue hair waiting for him at baggage claim. 

Lucas had been taller than almost anyone Doyoung has ever met, and almost painfully jovial. His seemingly-earnest enthusiasm had, perhaps ironically, made the first seeds of doubt in Doyoung start to bloom. 

Though, it’s not like Doyoung hadn’t planted them before he had ever made the reckless decision to leave Korea. His obsession has made him hard headed and far-too-focused, but he has always prided himself on at least being aware of how it is affecting his life.

These days Doyoung isn’t necessarily proud of the decisions he has made, especially as he watches Lee Taeyong disappear out of the vault with a large metal case in hand. 

He isn’t proud of what he’s _about_ to do; it breaks almost every single one of his personal ethics, and yet. 

He’s here. He’s doing it.

He’s stuck. 

Though that is not necessarily the right word for it.

He _feels_ stuck, but he has only reached this point by making his own decisions. It would be unfair to lay any blame on anyone but himself. 

After all he had known right from the moment Kun had offered it to him, sitting in the far corner of a 24 hour cafe in Gangnam, that it was too good to be true. Too good to be honest. Too impossible an opportunity to miss, no matter the moral quandary. No matter the cost. 

He’s known for a very long time now, ever since that very first day his soul mark had first started to fade, that he was going to spend the rest of his life answering the questions no one seemed to have answers for. 

And it has made him hard headed and too-focused and often hard to like. He is not ignorant to his short-comings. 

He knows he has limited the scope of his own life in this quest to find answers that never seem to fit. His future is as uncertain as the raised burn on his Soul Mark and it has made him vulnerable in ways he abhors. 

It has made him vulnerable in ways that allowed people like Qian Kun to find him, and lead him like an animal on a leash.

He should have been a teacher, his mother has bemoaned at her every opportunity. Use his obsession towards a more useful end. 

But she doesn’t understand, she _can’t._ His parents both share a neat little mark, unobtrusive and kind, like the pair of them together. His brother’s mark, Gongmyung’s mark, has always been more interesting, more bold. His mark sits two shades lighter than their parents, but darker than Doyoung’s had been, before. Doyoung had always had less chance of meeting his other half than the rest of his family. His obsession is simply something any of them can quite grasp. 

And Doyoung cannot understand how his mother thinks he would be a good teacher, how he could possibly help guide the young when he cannot guide himself. 

It’s why he’s here, now. It’s why he’s found himself halfway across the world in the Cambridge Archives with his heart feeling like a stone weight inside his chest. Searching for answers amongst the hidden histories, the old magics long forgotten, long _buried_.

He has always told himself he was willing to make a deal with the devil in order to find the answers he’s looking for. To put an end to the questions that makes his heart ache. But his first mistake was forgetting that the devil doesn’t always wear horns. Sometimes he wears cardigans. 

Doyoung’s hands are shaking as he signs himself out of the archive, feeling a pang of jealousy at his poor security clearance compared to that of the man who had just left a moment prior. 

Lee Taeyong is everything Doyoung had been prepared for, everything he has grown to hate about the fabled tomb raiders. The first in and first out. Tourists amongst history’s greatest treasures. 

Gongmyung has tried explaining them away more than once, but Doyoung has folders filled with their past destructions. Past potential erased before he could even know of their existence.

Taeyong himself is responsible for the destruction of the tomb he had pilfered that key from. Seismic activity had uncovered the tomb in the mountains of the Chitwan National Park for the first time in a thousand years, and Lee Taeyong and his barbaric team had caused it’s complete destruction in a handful of hours. 

Doyoung would have happily taken out his frustrations against the cocky Tomb Raider given the chance, but Kun has other plans. 

Doyoung had been chosen _because_ of how well he fit into them. He is a cog in this machine, and his reward are answers.

Even knowing what he does now, what he has signed himself to, it’s still not enough for him to waver. Still not enough for his morality to return to him. 

Not when he’s come so far, not when this could be his only chance. 

The Maiden Tree. If they’re right, if Kun is right, then Doyoung could finally end this. He _needs_ to end this.

The sun is bright and bristling as Doyoung stands just beyond the alcoves of the O’Connell Building, watching as a large trailer is being attached to the back of an ugly looking jeep. 

His fingers itch and he ignores the rush of anxiety crawling down his spine as he pulls out his phone. 

It barely rings. He always answers faster than Doyoung can find his courage. 

“Hello Doyoung,” Kun says, with that familiar comforting tone that makes Doyoung almost shiver instead. 

Kun is far away from Doyoung right now. He may not even be in England at all, but Doyoung still feels cornered, still feels like the fool he has been playing since the moment Kun had approached him, offering him the praise and forethought he had _longed_ for. 

He had thought back then it was too good to be true, simply finding someone who believed he had something worth chasing. That his chosen field was not a dead end, that there was promise and possibility, if only he could be provided the opportunity. 

But Kun had offered him so much more than a simple complement. Kun had offered him a future he never thought possible. 

All it had taken in exchange was his soul. 

A deal with the devil.

“How are you enjoying the archive?” Kun asks. He sounds pleasant, voice even and kind. 

“He came in. Like you wanted him to,” Doyoung says instead of answering Kun’s question. 

Kun lets it slide and Doyoung appreciates the reprieve, because as much as he hates why he is here, as much as he hates that _this_ is the sole price his morals are worth, he doesn’t regret this. He doesn’t regret being able to experience this archive and all the secrets he has known are lurking just below the surface of common-known history. 

It is everything that is about to happen that he hates. Everything that happens next will be because of this moment. He is complicit, guilty. 

He may not be a part of Kun’s team, his trusted inner circle. 

But after today he is just as guilty as they are. 

“And did he take it?”

“He did.” 

“You’re sure the item is being removed?”

“He took it with him. I watched him take it out of the vault and leave with it.”

“Good. So long as we’re clear. I would hate ever so much to start all this only to find it still sitting in the archive out of reach.”

“It’s definitely gone,” Doyoung says, watching Lee Taeyong climb into the front seat of his ugly black jeep.

“Wonderful,” Kun says, and Doyoung can hear him smiling. 

“Lucas will be waiting for you at the apartment, Doyoung. I’m sending him now, so do try not to linger,” Kun admonishes and then hangs up.

And just like that, Doyoung’s part is done. 

*

“Fire!” Johnny crows and starts shooting wildly. 

Taeyong’s lungs are burning as he twists madly, contorting his body out of instinct alone and he feels the air ripple as the bullet misses him by centimetres.

“Hahaha! Miss!” Mark crows and Johnny lets out a heavy boo of disappointment as he reloads the nerf gun. 

Taeyong giggles as he lets his body weight drop, the elastic pulling taught as he slips closer to the ground and hangs upside down for a moment to catch his breath.“You’re getting so good, hyung!” Mark shouts from where he’s perched on the second-floor balustrade with a pair of binoculars and Taeyong laughs again at his enthusiasm.

“I just think Johnny’s aim is getting worse!” he teases, and Johnny lets out a wounded cry.

“He _is_ getting old, his vision might be starting to go,” Mark agrees and giggles happily, trying to duck under the nerf bullet aimed at _him_ this time. Taeyong watches fondly and slowly curls himself so he’s standing right way up again, the blood rushing in his head for a moment and he enjoys the vertigo like the adrenaline junkie he is. 

None of them have had an ordinary upbringing in any way shape or form, and there really aren’t many moments that prove that than nights like this. 

It’s technically a training exercise, Mark with his call outs, Johnny with his sniper rifle and Taeyong with his harness. 

But there really is nothing particularly professional about it all. 

Johnny is wearing a tiger onesie; Mark is using a pair of children’s Toy Story binoculars and Taeyong is hanging from his own living room ceiling in his pyjamas. 

But they gave up professional a long time ago. 

Growing up in the Korean branch of the New Council of Theology had been an exercise in the peculiar. It had been an exhausting gauntlet of learning in all its facets. Taeyong had spent more of his youth learning how to disengage a bomb than how to ride a bike or play soccer. 

His schooling had been intense and specific, trained with a singular goal in mind, and there had been no limits, or limit to the _expense_ it took to get there. 

His upbringing was two parts brain to one part brawn, but the skills he had learned were so ingrained he enjoyed them in their hilarity. They had given him the tools to become who he is today, to do what he does, though not perhaps in the way that the Council had designed for him; but in the scope of things his career has done more for them than some of his fellow students have. 

Not that he will allow them any closer to his cousin and Mark than they already are. 

Inheriting his missing father’s empty estate when he turned twenty had simply given him the freedom to indulge in the more ridiculous ventures he had been taught entirely for himself.

He likes to explore, but he also likes to be at home when he is at home and as Hyuckie had put it once, why on earth would you go to a gym when you could build one at home? 

Taeyong has used that exact opinion to build an elaborate climbing and abseiling course that quite literally lets him hang upside down in his foyer as and when he wants to. 

Sometimes it’s good to just have some me time.

And his family just so happens to be as entertained by their bizarre lifestyle as he is. 

“Loose!” Johnny crows and Taeyong ducks immediately, twisting around to throw Johnny a pointed look as he shouts his victory to the sound of his phone buzzing. 

“It doesn’t count when you cheat like that, hyung!” Mark calls and Johnny ignores him in favour of checking his phone. His expression, if possible, lights up even more. 

“Jaehyunnie just got back from Busan and wants to skype. You happy up there, Icarus?” 

“Yeah, I’m good. Go make sappy faces and cry at your man,” Taeyong grins, letting his body weight drop him slowly towards the ground. 

Johnny grins and spins off his chair happily, bouncing up the stairs like a six-foot Tigger. 

“I’m gonna go annoy Hyuck,” Mark calls climbing over the banister and Taeyong laughs. 

“Abandoned by all who love me,” he moans, and Mark makes an embarrassed sound in his throat as he scampers down the stairs. 

Alone in the hall again, Taeyong closes his eyes and pushes off the ground to swing back up towards the roof. 

Without Mark, Johnny, and his nerf darts, its always incredibly peaceful up here, and going through the motions, the familiar strain on his muscles is soothing in a way that the same thing inside an actual Tomb simply cannot be. 

It’s quiet and calming and he swings through as many of his exercises as he can remember without thinking too hard. 

But it doesn’t last. 

The problem with having a favourite cousin obsessed with innovative technology is that it doesn’t always work. So, when the silent alarm goes through the house and Taeyong’s wrist band starts buzzing obsessively, he swings himself up to loop his feet around the chandelier and remove the detachable earpiece and push it in.

“Lee Donghyuck what have you done?” he asks with a huff. 

“It wasn’t me this time, I swear. Hyung, I think we might actually have something – “ the audio glitches out as Hyuck speaks and the pair of them go quiet for a beat.

“Oh shit, _hyung_ – “

“I know. Lock it down, Hyuckie.”

Taeyong can hear Hyuck’s frazzled typing as he pulls himself up and loops one arm around the top of the lighting bracket so he can have full view of the entire foyer. 

He can hear the grinding of the vault doors going down from somewhere below him and waits silent and patient until he hears them slam shut and lock into place.

“Lock yourself up, Hyuck. Full security protocols,” he murmurs, listening intently in the silence. 

“You know how long that takes to undo- “ Hyuck whines. 

“Do it, Donghyuck,” Johnny says, finally joining the system chat, sounding irritated.

He was probably wearing headphones talking to Jaehyun and missed the silent alarm. 

Taeyong’s old instincts want to scold him, but when the house is still quiet he doesn’t want to move. He doesn’t want to show his hand. 

Not when they have the advantage. 

“Hyuck?”

“Panic room engaged,” Hyuck scowls and his pettiness is the only thing that cracks Taeyong’s single minded composure.

“Mark?” 

“He’s in here,” Hyuck mutters. 

“He’s with you?”

“Here, hyung!” comes Mark’s voice through Donghyuck’s mic and Taeyong lets out a sigh of relief. 

“Stay safe. Johnny, anything yet?”

“West wing. One of the old thermal sensors is picking up a heat signature.”

“Fucking hell that’s my _garage,_ ” Taeyong whines, waiting until he spots Johnny coming down the corridor, his shot gun over one shoulder and his long range over the other. Taeyong’s belt and USP Match pistols in the crook of his arm. 

“Swing over,” he says, eyebrow raised.

Taeyong holds his hands out to catch them and Johnny snorts. 

“I’m not throwing them at you. You can’t catch for shit.”

“I can catch fine,” Taeyong pouts but lets go of the light anyway, dropping down to the second level with ease and taking the belt. 

Neither of them are well prepared; Taeyong is in workout clothes and Johnny is still wearing his tiger onesie, though he’s swapped his slippers for combat boots.

“At least put on a vest, Johnathon.”

“If they’re going to put holes in Johnny the tiger they can put holes in Johnny the person, too.”

“It’s moments like these I’m glad our soul marks never matched," Taeyong sighs. 

“Jaehyun resents that,” Johnny mutters, pouting, but he doesn’t look too perturbed about it, too engrossed in tracking the brightly lit intruders on his holo display. 

“How far off?”

“Not long. They’re grouping just out of range of the autolight sensors.”

Taeyong snorts, a little disappointed. He loves those sensors. They’re completely harmless, do absolutely nothing as far as his actual security goes, but the sprinklers alone have managed to scare the shit out of three would-be intruders over the years and the footage is some of his most cherished. 

“I really wish they’d just come in the front door, the insurance company is starting to be a real bitch about covering the cars,” Taeyong whines.

“Stop using them as battering rams, then,” Johnny replies adjusting his ammo belt around his onesie and double checking they’re full. 

“Pfft, doors are for losers,” Hyuckie says over the coms and Taeyong grins.

It really is a Lee Thing, he thinks. It's something they both definitely got it from their mothers. 

“Maybe we really should get rid of the car park entrance? I don’t like that they know it’s there,” he considers, out loud. Johnny snorts. 

“Well, Yongie dear, I think that’s a discussion for _after_ our house gets raided and not before. We can remodel the secret bunker of ancient cursed artifacts then.” 

“Haaaaaha, Johnny got cock blocked,” Donghyuck laughs over the comms and the answering grumble is enough to make Taeyong cackle. 

“Video call with Jae was going that well, was it?”

“Haaaaaha, Johnny’s a furry,” Hyuck sing-songs again. 

“You’re lucky you’re in that bunker, squirt,” Johnny threatens. 

“Haaaaaha, Johnny’s got blue balls,” Donghyuck cackles again and Johnny starts grumbling under his breath. 

“Any idea what they’re here for?”

“Probably the Imhotep crate; literally everyone's been trying to get their hands on that since the twenties.”

Johnny turns to look at him in horror so quickly that he hears his neck crick. Taeyong laughs as he brings up his own holo display and checks again where their intruders are. As Johnny said they were all grouping around the entrance to the car park just out of range of all the more modern security. 

“Taeyong, _please_ tell me you didn’t smuggle out a set of cursed Egyptian canopic jars from the Cambridge Institute,” Johnny begs and Taeyong flashes him a giddy smile. 

“I _smuggled_ nothing. You know they’re remodelling the security system in the vault and they needed somewhere to put the O’Connell’s files.”

“Yeah but you never said we’d be getting the O’Connell shit. Tell me the mummy isn’t downstairs, Taeyong, _please.”_

“The mummy is _not_ downstairs. Jungwoo wouldn’t let me store the books either.”

“Thank fuck for that, the last thing we need right now is Mark releasing the Hon Dai.” 

“I resent that,” Mark grouses over the comms but Hyuckie is still laughing and Mark doesn’t sound too put out by being the butt of the joke. 

Especially since out of all of them, he’s the one to have unintentionally set off the most ancient booby traps and has been banned from entering all ancient tombs until both Taeyong, Johnny and one of Donghyuck’s robots have all made a complete run through at least twice.

If any of them are going to unintentionally read from the Book of the Dead it’s definitely going to be Mark.

They all fall quiet after that as the shadows on the old heat sensors start to make their way towards the underground entrance to Taeyong’s garage. 

Hyuck starts moaning when his camera feed gets cut and Taeyong starts automatically calculating the cost of his expense report as the intruders start moving along the driveway and simply shoot every camera they find along the way. 

They’re fast and efficient and it’s obvious they’re clearly professionals.

“Keep your eye on the exits, I don’t want any of them getting up into the house,” Taeyong orders and Johnny huffs. 

“You’re always taking the fun jobs,” he moans, but as a decorated sniper it’s little more than white noise. Johnny can do more damage at a distance than most people can do with a car. 

“How many have we got, Hyuck?” Taeyong murmurs as he slinks into the garage and crouches down behind a pair of crates and takes careful stock of the garage entrance.

“Nine, hyung. Guy in charge looks to be the one with the AK-47.”

“Oh my _god,_ ” Taeyong says, fighting not to laugh. Johnny, in the other room, has no qualms and Taeyong can hear it echo through the house as well as the comm channel.

“Reckon he’s coming in first?”

“Well he’s standing back now letting his little grunts do the work.”

“What d’you reckon, Yong?” Johnny says and Taeyong can hear the grin in his voice. 

“You’ve got line of sight?”

“Heck yeah I do,” he crows and Taeyong laughs.

“Count it down, Hyuckie,” he says and tries not to twitch as he hears the locks on the gate grind and shriek as they’re pried open. 

Mr AK isn’t the first one through, but he _does_ push his way to the front almost immediately, gun held in front as he prostrates himself for their supposed victory. 

“What an _asshole,”_ Donghyuck laughs and that’s when Johnny pulls the trigger.

The crack echoes through the house and the target drops immediately and Johnny _whoops_. 

It’s on, then. 

The remaining intruders know they’ve been caught and scatter, one of them running right into Taeyong’s corner and he takes the shot before the poor ass can even turn to see where death is coming from. 

He spots a second through the gap between the Lamborghini and the quad bikes and shoots him to a small cheer from both Mark and Hyuck through the comms. 

“They’re calling for backup already, hyung,” Donghyuck snickers as Taeyong ducks low and shuffles his way towards the low end of the mechanics bench, watching as two shadows loop from either side of the room, one towards the stairs up into the main building, the other towards the security door that opens up directly into the vault. 

“Any idea who?”

“No names. The guy sounds pissed. He wants the others sent in.”

“Any sign of a second wave?”

“Nothing on the heat sensors,” Mark says. “Hyuck’s checking the perimeter now.”

They don’t get further than that when there is an _enormous_ crash of shattering glass from inside the house and Taeyong flinches, dropping down beneath the car and looking towards the entrance hall with a flare of terror. 

“Johnny?!” 

“Oh _Shit_ ! Taeyong the car park is a distraction; fucking _fuck_ \- a secondary team just dropped through the _fucking_ roof. I _LIKED_ THAT CEILING YOU KNOW. IT SURVIVED BOTH WORLD WARS, YOU ABSOLUTE _FUCKS_!” 

Anything else Johnny says is drowned out through the onslaught of gunfire that follows. 

Taeyong swears under his own breath and looks back to where he can see the dark outline of two black-clad intruders lurking between him and the stairs. It’s obvious now, getting him down here was easy, the real objective they have is to clearly keep him from getting back upstairs. 

Johnny is definitely right, and whoever is behind this knew this is exactly how it would play out. One of them, probably Taeyong, would come running to the main fight and be way too easily lead out of the way of the lead team.

Fucking hell, he’s an _idiot_.

“Give me eyes, Hyuck,” Taeyong says, voice low and stern as he pushes down his anxiety and draws back his focus. “How many upstairs?”

“Twelve. No, _eleven_ left,” he says to the echo of another high-powered round through Johnny’s mic.

“They’re definitely going for something in the vault, Hyung,” Mark says. “They’re grouping around someone so Johnny’s okay. They’re not overwhelming him.” 

“Oh yeah, I’m totally not overwhelmed,” Johnny huffs, his sarcasm underlined by gunfire. 

“Yeah cause there’s a little brat breaking into the vault, hyung,” Hyuck snarls and Taeyong huffs as he can hear his cousins furious typing over the mic. 

“Are the defenses up?’

“Of _course_ ,” Hyuckie snarls again and Taeyong can’t help but grin at the kid’s indignation. 

“But there’s only so much I can do against a _blowtorch_.”

“Oh, well at least they’re efficient. Just make sure the internal defenses are up and radio Hansol.”

“Already done, hyung. I called him before they got through the car park sensors. He’s on his way but we live in the middle of nowhere and we all know how useless the STRIKE teams are.” 

“Yeah, I know. Just, don’t give yourself away, Hyuck. I need you to be my eyes. I need to get back upstairs to help Johnny.” 

“Roger that, Roger. The closest balaclava is two point two to your eight o’clock, near the green astin, by the way. Taller than Taeil-hyung.” 

Taeyong can’t help but snicker, but Hyuckie’s information is perfect and he takes him out without an issue, dropping back behind his shield before the others can even place him.”

“Okay. Nice work, Duck. Where’s the next one?”

“Next one is a nosey ass poking his head out from behind Mark’s jeep. Five metres away, ten o’clock. Solid two metres tall; I’ll count it out.”

Taeyong lets Hyuck guide him and takes out the second man without a problem. The same can’t be said for Mark’s jeep, which immediately draws the fire of the remaining four scouts and the comms echo with Mark whining and Hyuck’s delighted laughter. 

“Where’s our number three?” 

“Coming in at the jeep, seven o’clock, twitchy little prick. Ummm, yeah that’ll do hyung,” Taeyong doesn’t question it and fires, grinning as he drops to the ground to the sound of the two boys whooping in success, and the automatic fire of the other three remaining mercenaries. 

“Where are the other three?”

“You’re gonna have to move, hyung, they know where you are. There’s a rolley trolley under the astin, you’ve got fifteen seconds to get there before line of sight.” 

Taeyong swears but does as he’s told, slipping out from under the cover and making a mad dash for Mark’s mechanic’s trolley. He hits it a little harder than intended, but it does its job and slips him quickly behind the remnants of his Astin not a moment too soon. 

Two of the mercenaries walk directly into his line of sight, both of them fixated on where he had been crouched behind the Bentley and without a moment’s hesitation he kneecaps the first and takes out the second while he has the chance. 

The last guy catches on quickly and Taeyong has to use the trolley to slide himself out of the way without thinking of where he’s ending up, and it’s only his reflexes that stop him getting shot at least twice. 

“Fucking shit,” he snarls at himself, kicking the trolley out of the way and letting the noise distract the more fixated of the two remaining guards long enough to put the injured one out of his misery. 

“Last guy is an asshole, isn’t he, hyung?” Donghyuck scowls over the comms and Taeyong hums in agreement.

“How’s Johnny doing?”

“He’s playing with them, hyung. They’re covering the guy with the blowtorch pretty well, but Johnny isn’t letting them get far,” Mark says and Taeyong can’t help but laugh.

“I could really use the backup here, kitten,” Johnny swears a moment later, sounding breathless.

“I’ve got one more to go and I’m all yours,” Taeyong replies and crouches down to check his ammunition. He doesn’t have as much as he’d like, but he can swipe one of the mercenary’s guns on his way out.

First, he just has to deal with the last one making a mess of his garage. 

“Where is he, Hyuck?” he asks and Donghyuck hums before letting out a gasp.

“What?!” Donghyuck squeaks, surprised. “What, no! _No_!”

Taeyong freezes. 

“Donghyuck what – “

“They’ve locked me out! No! _No_! No one locks me out! How the hell - it’s _my_ _house_!” 

“How the fuck is that even possible?” Johnny swears followed by a series of loud gunshots. 

“It _shouldn’t_ be! I don’t know how they’ve done it!” Hyuckie wails. 

Taeyong drowns them out as he slides under the Aston Martin and takes his shot, easily taking out the wing mirror of the Bentley and watching as his last target immediately starts tearing it up. The glass in the car shatters as the last one doubles down and he ducks back out of the way again towards the Lamborghini. 

“Hyuck if they get into the vault can they get into the system? Can they get anything?”

“Yes! They’ve locked me out of _my entire OS_ , hyung. I can’t get back in quick enough. Once they get through the wall there isn’t anything keeping them out.”

“Shit.”

“I’m _sorry_! I don’t know what happened,” Donghyuck cries, sounding strangely close to tears. 

“Hyuckie, it’s okay,” Taeyong murmurs and peers out from behind the Pergio towards where the garage entrance to his vault is.

“Do you have visuals?” 

“Yes, but I can’t move the cameras anymore.”

“Then don’t, just tell it like you see it. Don’t bring any more focus than you already have.” 

“Okay, okay. Right, where are you, you cockroach ridden infestation of a – “ Hyuck mutters under his breath, trailing off as he starts filtering through his camera feeds and Taeyong smiles. 

Right up until Johnny breaks the silence. 

“Could really do with some help up here, Yong. Some bastard in charge just arrived.”

“Give me a minute and I’ll be right there.” 

“Wouldn’t be asking if we had a minute left, hot shot, they’re almost through the - _fucking hell_ , Yong it’s Ten!” Johnny snarls and Taeyong’s stomach drops.

“ _What_?”

“He just fucking waltzed in the front door and the canon-fodder just parted like the red fucking sea.”

“Do not engage him, Johnny! Do not!”

“The fuck not? He deserves a little recompense.”

“You’re wearing fucking _pyjamas_ , Youngho, Jesus. And not when they know where the kids are,” he murmurs, quiet, as if Hyuckie wasn’t on their comm channels at all. 

He hears Johnny draw in a sharp breath and knows it’s worked. Knows that he isn’t about to do anything stupid.

“Fucking hell, you’re lucky I like you two,” he mutters darkly and Taeyong hums. 

“Taeyong, if we do nothing he’s going to take it. They’re going after that stupid fucking key. He’s going to take it and we still have no goddamn idea what it’s for!”

“I know. But it’s _Ten_ , Johnny. We’re out of our depth here. We _can_ catch up, but we can’t keep up. We’re at the disadvantage here.”

“Taeyongie, left!” Hyuck cries out, interrupting their conversation and it’s only Taeyong’s reflexes that save him, bringing his gun up just in time to catch the last intruder coming at him around the side of the Pergio. 

He pulls the trigger before he can think and the man drops, his gun scattering away under the Lamborghini and Taeyong shudders, breathing around the flare of panic suddenly locking him into place.

“There aren’t anymore are there?” he croaks around the lump in his throat.

“None that we can see, hyung!” Mark says and Taeyong blocks out the scuffle as Hyuck smacks Mark for touching his screens.

He crawls back to his feet and stumbles towards the security door to the upstairs vault. 

His fingers are shaking with the adrenaline as he scans his way in, hearing Hyuck and Johnny yelling vaguely in the background as he stumbles up into the main room just as the intruders break through the lockdown box and its remnants clatter to the ground. 

Taeyong’s heart lurches at the achingly familiar grin Ten throws his way before bringing up his gun and making Taeyong duck behind a stack of crates to avoid getting his skull blown to smithereens. 

He’s too far away to do anything now, and with Hyuckie locked out of his system, Taeyong can only try to even watch as Ten picks up the key and waltzes out of the room, ducking madly out of the way as a hail of gunfire shatters against the glass walls of the vault in warning. 

Taeyong gives chase at his first chance anyway and is just fast enough to see Ten swan down the front steps and gracefully hook his arm around the waiting bracket of an already airborne helicopter and throw him a mocking salute as it pulls higher into the sky. 

Taking Ten, his men and Taeyong’s key with it.

“Mother _fucking_ – “ Taeyong swears and for the sake of it aims his pistol and takes a pot shot at the quickly disappearing aircraft. 

It doesn’t do anything, they’re almost too far away enough already for it to even hit, but it makes him feel better. 

Until he turns around to find Johnny standing in the doorway of his very-destroyed house and the anger returns.

“Well he’s just as much of an asshole as I remember,” Johnny snarks and despite himself Taeyong can’t help but laugh.

“Hansol’s gonna love this,” Taeyong sighs as he slips around Johnny and kicks aimlessly at the dust strewn remnants of a seventeenth century Delft Blue vase and the Joseon era chest it had been sitting on, both items he had won in a drunken game of poker with Sehun and Junmyeon and neither one of them cursed. 

Dammit.

“His blood pressure was getting too constant anyway,” Johnny says dragging blood and dust behind him with the dirty ends of his onesie tail.

“Any word on Hansol, Hyuck?” Taeyong asks, tapping at his communicator.

“They’re still en-route though I don’t know why they’re even bothering,” Donghyuck mutters. 

“Well they can always help sweep up,” Taeyong says. “Can you disable the panic room from in there or do you need the full system to reboot first?”

“Yeah I figured out how they locked me out, hyung, the Panic room is a closed system, so once I went into lockdown it made the rest of the house vulnerable and they just cut off the panic room that way.” 

“Well that’s something we can work on. Can you get out?”

“Yeah, it’s about sixty percent disengaged; we’ll be out soon.” 

“Make sure you’re wearing shoes,” Taeyong nags and smiles when his cousin scoffs but agrees anyway. 

Johnny is wearing a sour faced expression when Taeyong turns around and its one he hasn’t seen in a while but one he still knows intimately.

“Please don’t, Johnny. I’m already going to get it from Hansol I don’t need it from you as well.”

“Well maybe you do need to hear it twice! We got played, Taeyong! We got our asses handed to us!”

“Yes! By _Ten!_ By the one person who knows our handbook because he studied it right next to us. It’s not my fault we were at a disadvantage. He knew what he wanted _and_ what he was up against!”

“Did you know he was alive? Because as far as _my_ files say he’s KIA.” 

Taeyong scowls. 

“Oh, shut up, I never thought for a moment he was dead and neither did you.”

“But did you _know?”_ Johnny replies with an earnestness that this time makes Taeyong pause. He rubs at his eyes. 

_“_ Please don’t, Johnny. Please don’t question my integrity like that. I wouldn’t keep something like that a secret. Not from you.”

Johnny’s expression is pinched and Taeyong’s heart thumps painfully. Its obvious what Johnny is hinting at and the headache building in Taeyong’s head squeezes itself tighter around his skull. 

“ _That_ was different, and you know it. He was a little boy. You would have done the same.” 

“I know. Which is why I know the sort of thing it takes to make you lose yourself, Taeyong. And as much as I wish I could say Ten isn’t one of those blind spots we both know I’d be lying. I just want to know where we’re standing because I get the feeling this is going to be a lot. Tennie wouldn’t have resurfaced again otherwise.”

“I haven’t seen him or heard from him in three years, Johnny. Same as everybody else. I never believed he died, because I refused to. The Ten we knew wouldn’t have gone down like they said he did.” 

“The Ten we knew wouldn’t have turned on us, either, Taeyong.”

“Well maybe we didn’t know him as well as we thought we did. Look. You're right. We had a promise, me and him, that we’d let each other know we were okay. There’s a safety deposit box in London and it hasn’t been touched. So yes. You’re right, Ten is one of my blind spots. But whatever we had wasn’t enough for him to let me know he was alive and okay like he promised he would. We’re not like you and Jae. We’re not Soul Mates, Johnny. We never were. So, can we leave it alone, please?”

When Taeyong turns around to look at Johnny the expression on his old friend’s face hurts. It aches in his bones and that look makes Taeyong long for the days when they were young and untouched by the world far more than seeing Ten did. 

A longing for the days when they were together and united. The six of them against the world, instead of scattered across it like leaves on the wind. 

Johnny opens his mouth to say something when their comms hum and Donghyuck’s voice nervously announces that the Panic room has finally disengaged. 

“Thank you, Hyuckie,” Taeyong says, making a break for it. “Be careful coming downstairs.”

“Maybe bring a broom,” Johnny suggests, and Taeyong can feel Johnny’s eyes on his back the whole way back into the house. 

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> I hope you fell in love with my boys as much as i have writing them. I adore this fic so much i couldn't let it sit around unloved any longer than it already has. 
> 
> If you'd like to chat I can be found on twitter and curious cat and i'm always open <3
> 
> [ @CaptainJacq](http://twitter.com/captainJacq)
> 
> [ Curious Cat"](Http://curiouscat.me/CaptainJacq)
> 
> Until next time  
> MWAH  
> xxxx


	4. Chapter III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a lot to unpack after the invasion and Taeyong's pretty sure this headache is only just starting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know its been quite a while since this fic has updated, but i really appreciate every single one of you reading this fic, but it would be remiss of me not to mention the lovely anon who has left me some lovely words in my CC recently and brought me back to this at the right time to get this chapter done. Without you I'm not sure how much longer it might have taken me, so thankyou! <3  
> Oh how I adore these boys and this fic and I have missed them, so i truly hope you enjoy this next part and everything that will come next!
> 
> MWAH  
> xxx

** III **

From the time it takes the team to leave, to when they start sweeping back into the room in victory, it has been roughly the longest six hours of Doyoung’s life.

His heart has been in his throat the whole time, a thick, clogging feeling that has left him feeling sick and shaky for hours.

Kun has appeared calm and collected the whole time and Doyoung has no idea how he’s managed it.

How he has kept his composure after ordering something like this. After sending his people out to do something like this. Sending his _Soul Mate_ out.

Between the two of them, Ten definitely appears the more dangerous one, with his collection of lethally pointed knives and the wicked mischief in his eyes.

Kun, on the other hand, looks sort of familiar and kind and approachable when he’s relaxed. This is the Kun that Doyoung met for the first time. He had been wearing a cardigan and talked with Doyoung about Chinese Soul Mate Theory for nearly four hours without pause. The Kun from back then looked like he meal plans and he had sat at their coffee table and knitted while Doyoung talked and while the Kun of _now_ isn’t the same one from back then, he’s close enough that Doyoung has never been more terrified of anyone than he is of Qian Kun.

But Doyoung is in far too deep for anything to really matter anymore.

Kun has spent most of the time before and after the operation with his head in a book, ignoring Doyoung’s slow-burning panic with a pleased curl in the corner of his mouth, and it’s only when they hear the raucous noise of impending chaos that Kun sets the book aside and even looks at Doyoung again.

The sound of the approaching team makes Doyoung’s stomach flop unpleasantly and he swallows down as much of his anxiety as he can before the door slides open and Yukhei strides in looking bored and sulky with Dejun quick on his heels, computer bag slung carefully over his shoulder.

Ten is only a moment behind them, looking incredibly pleased with himself and there is a sharp-edged gleam to the look in his eyes when he strides across the room. His satisfied grin makes Doyoung feel uneasy.

Yangyang follows immediately after, finally letting the door slide shut before skipping up to the table and perching himself on the edge of Yukhei’s chair and settling himself in with a giddy grin. Unlike Dejun and Yukhei, his fatigues are covered in a layer of dust and metal shavings and blood and Doyoung hates that Kun agreed to send him in. That it was the basis of their whole plan – letting a child break through a military vault door.

Not that Yangyang was in charge, that was Ten, who sets a large metal case down on the table with a self-satisfied thud.

There’s blood sprayed all over it and it makes Doyoung’s gut churn again, burning away any hint of excitement crawling its way up from the tips of his fingers.

“Told you it was easy,” Ten grins, Cheshire-wide at Kun whose expression barely shifts from its intensity as he quirks an eyebrow in consternation.

“Let’s make sure you stole the right thing, shall we?” he says, pulling the case towards himself and unlocking it one by one before letting it fall open.

Despite himself, Doyoung’s stomach lurches at the sight of the artefact sitting on the table in front of him, gleaming in the brilliant overhead fluorescents. His fingers itch impulsively and his heart rate picks up.

Even from here he can see the fine grooves in the stonework from the tools used to carve out the intricate runes thousands of years ago. His eyes follow the guiding lines of the carvings, eking out each impossible image one at a time.

He wants it, more than he had before, in the collection of the university. He wants it now more than when it was in the hands of the bastardous Tomb Raider.

He wants to unlock every single one of her mysteries.

“I told you I’d get it,” Ten shrugs, still staring at Kun with a single mindedness that Doyoung knows he doesn’t actually care for anyone else in the room.

“But did you stay out of it?” Kun asks quietly, like he already knows the answer and Yangyang snorts in amusement.

“He came waltzing in at the last minute so he could get into the vault first. The big one got reeeeal pissed at that. He put three shots into Lao right when Tennie was walking inside, like five centremetres away from his head. He wanted to shoot you _so bad_ , gege,” Yangyang giggles, draping himself over Yukhei even more in his dramatics.

“I asked you to stay out of this, Ten,” Kun says, looking towards his soul mate almost lazily if it wasn’t for the sharp gleam in his eyes and the pinch around his mouth.

Ten almost blushes.

“I tried, baby. I did.”

“You gave our hand away. Blatantly.”

Ten pouts and his eagerness for Kun’s attention gives way to his complete inability to keep his mouth shut. Doyoung watches his gaze narrow and shifts nervously.

“Pfft, and I’ve told you over and over again; Taeyong isn’t _dumb_. He was the favourite back then for a _reason,_ Kunnie. He was always going to have this figured out the moment we made our move. It doesn’t matter who Youngmin hired as the muscle, he’s going to know the WeiShen are behind it, and I’ve been in China way too long for him not to figure that out too. We know what he knows, we know what cards he has and we can use that.”

“I’m glad you have all your excuses prepared, love, but I am not the only one you have to justify your decisions to. Remember our benefactor first not your personal vendettas," Kun says, and there is a tightness as he speaks, even if his voice is soft. An edge to his words, brows pinched and mouth stern as he simply faces Ten down.

And this is why Doyoung fears Kun more than his Soul Mate. Something flickers across Ten’s face, an expression that Doyoung has seen before, staring at himself in the mirror. Ten is dangerous, his wrists glint with three knives that Doyoung can see clearly defined, but Kun is the one cutting deep. And he does it without even raising his voice.

Ten’s smile turns sharp instead of steel and whatever vulnerability Kun has used against him, drowns under the sheer rebuke Ten offers in its place.

“Well, i guess my job is done, then. I’m not the one who figures out who has what you want; I’m just the one who goes and gets it for you, right? Come and get me when Youngmin needs something else,” Ten sneers, blowing Kun a kiss as he swans out the door.

*

The dust has barely settled from the first helicopter ruining Taeyong’s lawns when another starts hanging low over the estate and Taeyong watches it lands neatly and Hansol leads a small STRIKE team up towards the house.

He already looks as tired as Taeyong feels.

“Long night?” Johnny asks as Hansol meets them at the door.

“Indeed, though doesn’t look anywhere near as exciting as yours,” Hansol says idly, peering up at the shattered ceiling out at the stars above.

“We like to keep the weekends fun, you know?” Johnny shrugs, sweeping a circle of dust around the masked corpse and it’s somewhat-localised-bloodpool in front of him.

“Any idea who we have interrupting my Saturday?” Hansol asks, kneeling down at another body and idly poking at the butt of the gun half draped over the top of it.

“WeiShenV,” Taeyong says, slumping down onto the remnants of his favourite chaise lounge. It groans a little but doesn’t bust.

Hansol looks up so quickly Taeyong can almost hear his neck crack.

“You’re sure?”

“It’s my best bet. They’re who Ten was last affiliated with, right?”

“Yes. He was working with Sicheng the last time he was seen before the incident. You’re saying you saw _Ten_?” Hansol’s confusion isn’t quite the shock it should be, considering the fact Ten is supposed to be dead. But Taeyong never found anyone who believed it when it happened. He’s not really expecting anything distraught.

“Saw is an understatement. He walked right in the front doors like he owned the place. A little shit with a blowtorch opened the security gates on the key I found in Nepal a few months ago, Ten tried to shoot me in the face to say hello and waltzed out like nobody’s business.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Yeah.”

“Did you know he was alive?” Johnny asks Hansol, who definitely looks cagey about the question.

Taeyong snorts.

“You’re still shit at lying, Hyung.”

“Yes, well that’s why I spend all my time at HQ and not in the field. Bureaucracy does all the lying for me.”

“Well what does Mr Bureaucracy have to say about all this? Because there’s clearly more to this key than we knew, and I’d bet anything that the Scholars know more than they’re saying.”

“We know very little. Painfully little.”

“Then what the hell does the WeiShenV know that we don’t?” Johnny asks, brows still pinched in annoyance.

“A question we _will_ be answering.”

“And by we you mean us.”

“Unless you would like me to give it to Sehun and Chanyeol?” Hansol asks with a gentle smirk that Johnny plays into without noticing, just like he always does.

“Sehun once couldn't recognise me when I was standing next to him, what makes you think adding Chanyeol is gonna change _that_?”

“Seulgi was complaining the other day that she wants a good case to chew on…”

“No!”

“Alright then,” Hansol grins, clearly very happy with himself and Taeyong has to fight the sudden fondness uncurling in his chest, like a flower long shy of the sun.

“So, do you have anything useful?” Taeyong asks and Hansol makes a face.

“Let me call the Council and I’ll let you know.”

*

It’s not that Taeyong doesn’t trust Hansol.

He does. Sort of.

It's more that Hansol works for the Council and Taeyong doesn't necessarily trust _them_. He certainly doesn't trust them with his personal security. The only person who is allowed to play with that is Hyuck, and that only doubles when it comes to the fact that said security right now is already compromised.

So, instead of leading Hansol down to Hyuck’s little dungeon Taeyong takes the Head of the NewKIDD project to an upstairs office to use for the next few hours that is at least two floors away from Taeyong’s own, and completely isolated off the system.

Hansol, in turn, gives Taeyong his STRIKE team to order about.

As it turns out, Hansol’s new squad are a herd of _actual_ children that Taeyong feels awful putting to work, considering the work involved is cleaning all the bodies out of his foyer and hosing the blood out the front steps.

So he puts Mark in charge, who looks far too happy about bossing them about.

But considering Hansol ran late enough to avoid the actual shooting Taeyong counts himself at least partially lucky because if someone else doesn’t start to do something about his house then Hansol’s new mission is going to get derailed because Taeyong will be doing it himself.

And once he starts he is _never_ going to stop.

There is dust on _everything._

The entire foyer and all the valuables Johnny convinced him he needed to display and show off are all shattered, broken or blood stained and there are bullet holes _everywhere._

The entire middle of his house needs a complete renovation and frankly _that_ is more stressful than the fact that Ten just resurfaced with a Chinese gang to invade his house.

Thankfully he has something far more pressing to pay attention to than think about any of that too hard, and so he blatantly ignores the squishy-faced kid dragging a body bag in each hand as he hurries past them to meet the familiar Lamborghini speeding up his long driveway.

Jungwoo climbs out like he’s filming a hair commercial, as always, but Taeyong isn’t expecting Taeil to climb out the other side of the car.

“Sorry to crash your party, Taeyong-hyung, but I’m here on behalf of the Council,” Jungwoo says with a tepid smile as he leads the way up to the house.

Taeyong shrugs and pulls him in for a hug once’s he’s close enough.

“That’s okay, we were going to have to postpone dinner on Monday anyway. Need a new ceiling before we can have guests over. You know how it is.”

“Well we can always use our place in the meantime,” Jungwoo replies. “But unfortunately, we have a little business to deal with before then.”

“Oh good. Is this information you knew the other day, Taeil-hyung?” Taeyong asks, knowing he’s being a shit. Taeil’s sombre expression doesn’t waver.

“Do you have a projector working?” Jungwoo asks before Taeil can get around to a reply, and, feeling the uneasy energy coming off the pair, Taeyong leads them back into the main room where Hyuck is whining at Johnny.

“Hyuck, we need a projector,” he says to his cousin, who takes one look between Taeyong and where Jungwoo and Taeil are standing just behind him and nods.

“I’ll be right back,” he mutters and scampers off in the direction of his lab.

“So, can you tell us why you’re here?” Taeyong asks then, perching on the couch next to Johnny and fixing Jungwoo with his best stare down.

Despite technically being Taeyong’s superior in the Council hierarchy _and_ Taeil’s Soul Mate, Jungwoo still hasn’t quite settled into being able to tell people what to do yet.

It’s why he convinces people to help him instead. It makes him likeable, and Jungwoo is a joy regardless of his silver tongue.

That success is why he was promoted young, why he's the youngest Curator almost across the entire seaboard, and why Taeyong doesn't have a problem exploiting the fact that, unless he has a job to do, Jungwoo seems to like deferring to Taeyong.

Any time he has a problem with Taeyong bulldozing his way through a problem Jungwoo just convinces him otherwise and Taeyong barely notices. That is often the scariest part.

Tonight though, tonight Taeyong truly is in charge. This is _his_ house, _his_ territory, and despite his tribulations about it, he is technically _still_ Captain of the original 127 Field Team. 

This _is_ his jurisdiction.

And so Jungwoo reports to him the same way he does in the field.

“We know what happened here last night, obviously, but you weren’t the only ones hit.”

“What? Who else?” Johnny asks, perking up.

Donghyuck ruins the excitement by scattering back into the room with one of his contraptions under his arm and sets it up, taking the drive Jungwoo hands him and beaming up a data screen with a handful of images against their most undamaged wall.

“Last night the SHAWOL excavation vault in Naples was broken into. The only thing stolen was a sundial recovered from the temple of Aphrodite nearly a month ago.”

“A month ago? I thought that excavation started last year?” Johnny asks, leaning forward.

Jungwoo nods.

“It did, but the project ended up being larger than anyone predicted. It’s been six months and there are still items being brought up to the surface.”

Taeyong scoffs, feeling his headache build closer towards the migraine it clearly wants to be.

“And six months ago is the same time we found that bloody key. Any planets aligning we should have known about Taeilie?” Johnny asks, voice quirked in friendly joviality but there is a familiar undercurrent of seriousness that Taeyong can feel like a breeze.

“Not that I can find,” Taeil replies, just as serious. “I’ve checked.”

“ _But_ it is likely the same cosmic event uncovered both temples. From memory the Nepal site was a recent find by locals, right?” Jungwoo says, trying to break the tension.

“Rockslides revealed the first entrance markers,” Johnny replies.

“So, I’m guessing that’s what the Homer was for?” Taeyong asks Taeil, who grimaces.

“The Homer was because Baekhyun talks his mouth off. But Baek was onto something. We just didn’t know what.”

“But the WeiShen did.”

“So, you’re one step ahead of us already,” Jungwoo sighs. “Good. Because it took the boys in data analysis four hours to figure this out,” he says, leaning over Donghyuck’s shoulder to select one particular photo and bring it up.

It was a little grainy from being blown up so much, but Taeyong has seen that profile enough to recognise it anywhere.

Johnny immediately groans.

“That’s…. fucking Dong Sicheng. Of course, it was _Sicheng_.”

“Yep. So, all bets are off. This is definitely WeiShen work and everything is on the table. You’ve been authorised to do anything and everything to get the Sundial and Key back, courtesy of both the Council Trifecta _and_ her Majesty, so you’ve got clearance across the Centre authorities in Asia, Europe and Great Britain.”

“Well that’s new,” Johnny mutters and Jungwoo laughs.

“Yeah. I don’t think I’ve heard of anyone getting both at once. Be careful, Taeyongie. I think people know more than they’re saying.”

“Oh definitely. People _definitely_ know more than they’re saying,” Taeyong scowls.

“Who else was involved in Naples?”

“Nothing is confirmed, but this kid is a person of interest. Wong Kunhang. Trust fund kid. He’s young, but talented and very conveniently in Naples last night. Caught the first train out this morning. My guess is that Sicheng is in his luggage.”

“You and me both,” Johnny mutters under his breath. Taeyong tries not to laugh at the sheer exhaustion in Johnny’s voice.

They’re going to have to go somewhere fun after this. Definitely with Jaehyun. Johnny needs a good fuck or he’s going to be impossible to deal with.

“So, we have Sicheng in fucking Italy stealing a sundial only two dozen people in the world know exist, and we have Ten breaking into our goddamn vault to take a key Taeyong moved two days ago. Who the hell did the WeiShen hire as their coder?”

“That is still unknown, but we have ideas.”

“So do we,” Taeyong says, glancing idly at Donghyuck, who is angrily typing at his tablet with an ire that makes him want to giggle.

Donghyuck has taken it incredibly personally that someone managed to slip into his own system and Taeyong is dreading the fallout of whatever his cousin ends up doing as revenge, but until then angry Donghyuck is very productive Donghyuck and they can definitely use that.

“What have we got, sunshine?” Taeyong asks, leaning over to run his fingers through Donghyuck’s hair and pull at it childishly.

Hyuck’s pout becomes slightly more onerous but he looks up and aims his tablet at the projector and takes control.

Jungwoo watches the interaction idly and only raises a curious brow at Taeyong when he sits back up again.

“Despite the Centre’s best efforts there’s not a lot. They’ve been secretive since they reformed from the ashes of Vision116. Most of what’s known is readily available and you’d know it better than I would. Ten was seen working with Sicheng a few years ago, but it was only the once and when the job ended badly after the Council interfered again it was ‘believed’ that Ten died during extraction. We know that to be a huge fat lie,” Jungwoo says.

“Right.”

“What have you got, Hyuck?” Johnny asks and Hyuck stabs an angry finger at his tablet and sets off.

“So far, besides Ten and Sicheng, the suspected members of the as-current WeiShen inner circle include asshole number one with the blowtorch, whose name is Liu Yangyang. Lived in Germany for a while. Has a serious taste for stupid cars and like three separate outstanding warrants for hotwiring hotrods and street racing along the Autobarn. Which is actually pretty hot.”

“Hyuck, what have I said about this?” Johnny groans.

“I don’t know, I don’t really listen. Next up is Wong Kunhang, who, like Jwoos said, was seen in Naples yesterday. Not to mention a few other very convenient airports around very convenient disappearances over the last year. Was in the army for like a hot minute where he was trained with long range weaponry until he went MIA. So be careful. He’s a lot smaller than you, Johnny-hyung, and can fit in some weird places or so the rumours go. He’s a rich trust fund baby so you’d think he’s stupid as shit, but things got a little desperate when he went AWOL. So, someone _clearly_ trained him in something they don’t want anyone to know about.”

“Of course they did,” Johnny mutters and the irony of Johnny saying anything has Taeyong chuckling.

“And at last my nemesis. My enemy. The bastard who dared to besmirch these golden halls with his code. Who laid a digital assault on my child while I was away at war. Who infiltrated my house and harmed my people. His code name is Little Dragon which is _stupid_ , and he should feel bad. I’ve spent the morning going through everything I could and I’m pretty sure it’s this guy. He looks like he smiles too much, and he is _way_ _too tall_ , which is awful and his hair makes him look like a goddamn blueberry. His name is Wong Yukhei, if I’m right. Which I _am,_ because I have every intention of destroying him and digging into stuff people don’t want anyone to see is what I _do_.”

“Well that at least gives us a working roster. A sniper, a coder, a greaser, a tomb raider and a fixman. Who does the Centre think is running point?” Johnny muses.

“I mean everyone still thinks it’s Yixing, but he has _way_ better stuff to be doing than this.”

“Whatever ‘end of the world shit’ this is? You think Yixing has anything better?”

“Yes,” at least three people reply, including both Jungwoo and Taeil and Taeyong chuckles.

“Umm? Its Yixing?” Hyuck says, steamrolling on through. “So yes? Anyway, before Johnny interrupted by being stupid. My bets on this guy. Qian Kun. Don’t let his handsome baby face confuse you. He’s a Beijing Institute transfer. Has been working out of the Seoul Institute for a year. Was in the air force right out of school but ended up leaving after two years. He keeps himself squeaky clean, but like, with his credentials? He’s either in the Council or he’s a crook, and he’s not in the Council. I checked.”

“You know you’re going to get into trouble for hiding that backdoor again,” Johnny mutters, pointedly nodding in the direction of Jungwoo who just looks amused.

“It’s not _my fault_ no one has been able to find it. If they can’t get rid of it then they don’t deserve to have a secure system.”

“Well please close it for now. We don’t want our friend the Little Dragon to get his claws into the NCT database, Hyuck. Please, for God sake.”

Donghyuck goes a little red.

“I didn’t think of that. Okay. I’ll shut it down.”

“And I won’t build a new one,” Johnny says, looking pointedly at Donghyuck.

“And I won’t let Johnny build a new one,” Hyuck parrots solemnly.

It’s the best they can ask for, really, and even Johnny knows it.

Jungwoo just laughs at the whole performance.

“So, I guess the next question is _when_ exactly this Kunhang is meant to get off the train and where exactly he’s going to end up.”

“According to the time stamp on the ticket and his passport information it’s a one way trip through to Paris where both he and Sicheng are booked to fly straight through to Shanghai and will arrive at 6:30pm local time tomorrow.

“So, we have about thirty hours. Do we have anyone in the area who can intercept if need be?”

“There’s always people in the area.”

“Anyone you trust?”

“Jaehyun can be there in five hours,” Johnny points out and Jungwoo raises a brow at Johnny.

“Johnny we’re not sending your blackmarket fence boyfriend after Dong Sicheng.”

“Why not?” Johnny pouts and Taeyong laughs.

“He probably has him on the books,” he points out and Johnny’s pout turns into an exaggerated expression as he considers it.

“True,” he says before breaking out into a grin.

“Right, so with the goal of not getting a hit placed out on Johnny’s soul mate who else do we have that can help us intercept the goddamn WeiShen?”

The name comes to Taeyong immediately, sitting perfectly on the tip of his tongue without even thinking.

And he swallows it down before it chokes him.

“Who does Junmyeon have?” he asks instead.

“No one on immediate standby.”

“His team are the ones sending the information out of Naples. They flew in to help Kibum and Minho secure what’s left of the inventory,” Hyuck says, helpfully.

The white noise in Taeyong’s brain immediately goes deadly quiet the moment he hears Kibum’s name but there may as well be alarm bells ringing as he perks up, blood pumping with the adrenaline rush of knowing exactly who is at fault here.

Who exactly he can blame for the state of his house and his anxiety levels and his garage.

“It’s the fucking _Rabbit,”_ he mutters, standing up like there is electricity in his bloodstream.

Johnny looks at him funny as he marches over and pulls Donghyuck’s tablet out of his hands. Hyuck lets out an irritated squawk and smacks Taeyong’s thigh but he ignores him as he starts typing, searching through Hyuck’s database for a somewhat familiar name.

And a little more familiar face.

It’s his face that makes Taeyong pause. The arched dark eyes behind clear glasses, the condescending curl to his lips. He’s still as pretty as he was in person but Taeyong only cares about one thing.

“ _Kim Dongyoung,”_ Jungwoo says like he’s sounding the name out. Everyone is peering at Taeyong like he’s grown an extra head and he sort of feels like maybe he has _._ But the information he wants is sitting there.

Hyuck never told Taeyong his brother’s name but he still has the information there because his cousin is nothing if not dedicated to his snooping.

“Associates: Kim Gongmyung, brother, currently located in Naples, Italy. He’s Kibum’s goddamn bodyguard. The Rabbit is the link. He’s the one who told the WeiShen I moved the key.”

“Who is he?” Taeil asks and Taeyong huffs a laugh.

“He’s a baby archaeologist. Just transferred in and has been camping out in the catalogue. You told me you thought he knew more than he should about my key,” he reminds Taeil and watches as realisation climbs over their poor hyung’s face.

“The one with the cat!” he crows in victory and Jungwoo coos at him, like Taeil might be the cutest thing he’s ever seen.

Taeyong grins, swallowing down the jealousy the same way he does whenever he sees Johnny baby talking at Jaehyun over facetime.

“I met him three days ago when I went to pick up the transfers. Taeil was right, he knew too much about it, but I didn’t think it was enough to go this far.”

“So, this Rabbit has helped Ten get his hands on both the Sundial in Naples and the Key out of our own goddamn vault,” Johnny says, glaring at the screen with a subdued pout.

“Then what does this Rabbit know that we don’t?” Jungwoo asks.

“Well he’s studying soul mate theory,” Johnny hums, peering over Taeyong’s shoulder to read the information off the wall. “Bet he doesn’t show up for work tomorrow.”

“It’s the damn Maidentree,” Taeyong says, cutting everyone else off. “He lit up like Christmas when he mentioned the pages coming out of the Naples and Kentucky translation project. He thinks one of the new texts refers to the Maidentree.”

“Please don’t tell me you think all this is about that old wives tale,” Johnny moans.

“I don’t, _he does,”_ Taeyong says, pointedly, nodding at the screen where Kim Dongyoung’s profile still stares down at them.

“It’s scrap paper, Yong! Everyone’s looked into that story. The only thing that legitimises it, is the fact there’s only one of them. If there was a hint of truth to it someone would have found another link by now.”

“Don’t be ignorant about magic, John. You know just as well as I do that dangerous things are kept secret all the damn time. That doesn’t change, no matter where you sit in history.”

“Well I bloody hope it’s just a myth because I don’t want any precedent for me and Jae turning into _trees._ ”

“Why is Johnny being stupid?” Hyuck groans and Taeyong can’t help but laugh, reaching down to run his fingers through his cousin’s hair.

“Greek Mythology, Duckie. Your favourite.”

“I bet it was Zeus,” Hyuck says, making grabby hands at his tablet again.

“It’s always Zeus,” Taeil agrees solemnly as Hyuck brings up the translated copy of the original myth. It was a nice story, Taeyong had to admit, staring at the detailed photograph of centuries old parchment. It was a stunning document. Time had been put into making it beautiful. If it was just a children’s tale, as a great number of embarrassed scholars had loudly proclaimed after nearly a decade of empty searching, then it had been a favoured one.

Most stories about Soul Mates were.

But the Maidentree was different. Instead of the tales about being split apart, the Maidentree was about two halves being re-joined. Finding each other, and refusing to let go.

Two young lovers who had found each other again after they were split apart by Zeus’ bolt and when their families had tried to separate them again, they had refused, begged for help, and so Aphrodite turned them into two trees, wrapping around each other to form one whole, so that they could never be separated again.

“I still think we shouldn’t put all our eggs in one basket, Tyong,” Johnny says, breaking Taeyong’s attention. “Even the Council doesn’t think the Maidentree myth has any credit.”

“Actually, there isn’t anything credible that disproves the Maidentree myth. It’s just as likely to be legitimate as it is to be documentation of a children’s story,” Taeil says, throwing Johnny a smug smile and Jungwoo cackles.

“Taeil, honeybun, you’re not helping,” Johnny tuts, and the others laugh.

Taeyong, however, finds his attention caught once again on the scroll projected on his bullet infested walls.

Two trees, wrapped around each other so they could not be forced apart.

It really wasn’t that large of a stretch to link his key with this scroll. The Rabbit had been right there. It was so obvious a link that it would have been found eventually by the basic NCT systems comparison analysis. Kim Dongyoung had simply found the link much faster.

And he had found a second document. A second scroll he believed was linked to the Maidentree.

_The world was a much smaller place back then!_

“The key is a definite link,” Taeyong says, breaking through the tuned out muttering of his friends as he turns to face them. Johnny’s expression is pinched, but he still doesn’t say anything.

“The tree statues in the Nepal temple are enough to prove to me this has something to do with the Maidentree myth.”

“The ones that self-destructed when you finished graverobbing?” Hyuck cackles and Johnny gives him a gentle kick.

“You know we don’t have enough footage of them to back that up,” Johnny says, and Taeyong just shrugs.

“it doesn’t matter. Right now we don’t have to prove it. This isn’t publishing. This is about figuring out what the WeiShen want with that key and this sundial and to stop them before anything happens. This is the only link we have, Johnny. You don’t have to protect me from this. Soulmates or not, we have to do this.”

That shuts Johnny up, it shuts them all up. But it’s Johnny that Taeyong is looking at. Johnny who has been there, who has shared the weight of Taeyong’s secrets and misdeeds.

It’s Johnny’s help Taeyong needs with this.

And he knows it.

“What do we know, then?” Johnny asks, voice deepening on instinct as he finally gives in.

“We know that the Rabbit had access to scans of the sundial, courtesy of his brother.”

“The Aphrodite excavation is still ongoing, most of the recovered artefacts haven’t even finished being catalogued yet. If Kim knew about it at all then that means the sundial had to have been one of them already finished. Which means we have the ability to see exactly the same images this Kim Dongyoung saw.” Jungwoo points out.

“Pull them up, Hyuck,” Taeyong says, looking down at his cousin.

“What makes you think I can just pull up confidential information like that?” Hyuck whines and rolls his eyes when Johnny fixes him with a Look.

“Fine,” he mutters and starts poking at his tablet again.

“Need me to get the laptop?” Mark asks, from where he’s been lingering in the doorway, eavesdropping.

“ _Yes_ ,” Hyuck pouts, like it was a stupid question and Mark disappears back into the rest of the house again.

“You’re sure about this archaeologist, Taeyong?” Jungwoo asks carefully, one last time, and he nods.

“Taeil said someone definitely got him into the archive and I have to agree with him. He was looking at artefacts like he couldn’t believe they were real. He was like a kid in a candy shop.”

“Or a Taeyong,” Johnny mutters under his breath and Hyuck laughs.

“He’s new to all this. And it’s way too convenient. He had more to offer than he was given. Access to both the Naples projects _and_ the Cambridge Archive? He was a security risk waiting to happen.”

“See! Non secure system!” Hyuck cackles and Johnny smacks him.

“Think if our little sunshine here has a backdoor into the archive that the Little Dragon might too?”

“It’s definitely plausible. They are doing an overhaul of the system at the moment.”

“No time better to get a hook in when the door is already open.”

“Or did they open the door to get the key out?” Taeil points out.

“I hate it when you do that,” Johnny says, staring at Taeil with the exhaustion of a very tired parent. Taeil doesn’t look fussed.

“What about it, Woo?” Taeyong asks, turning towards Jungwoo who is staring at Hyuck’s projector screen with a concentrated frown.

“It’s not entirely impossible,” he replies but doesn’t look convinced either way.

“Do you know who authorised the overhaul?”

“I assumed it was the Librarians. It had to be someone on high.”

“Hyuck? Can you find out?” Johnny asks and Hyuck rolls his eyes as he pulls his tablet closer again.

“Let me see.”

“The question is not who authorised the overhaul, but who authorised you removing artefacts from the vault at all.”

Hansol’s voice cuts across the room and they all turn to face the doorway where he is standing. Jungwoo is the first to break the quiet, clearing his throat nervously.

“I did,” he admits and Taeyong can see his thoughts quickening. Not that Taeyong is about to let Jungwoo convince himself he’s has a part to play in this. Taeyong might be too gullible, too firm to trust, but even despite the fact that _Ten_ was aiming a gun in his face just a handful of hours ago, Taeyong isn’t about to let Hansol turn him against _Jungwoo._

“Was I the only one taking over temporary storage?”

“No?” Jungwoo replies, sounding more unsure despite the fact Taeyong knows this isn’t a lie because he’d seen the pile of crates destined for Irene’s himself while he was at the University.

“Then this goes beyond you. If the system has been compromised then our standard procedures are going to be taken advantage of. That’s all this is. Somehow they managed to get the key here, and they took advantage of that. They used mine and Ten’s history and got what they needed. That still says more about who agreed to the overhaul than Jungwoo delegating a manifest.”

Hansol’s mouth is still a grim line but he doesn’t argue as he finally brokers the line separating them from the rest of the house.

“So you have a rough idea of the Weishen’s roster?”

“I’d go one step better than _rough_ ,” Hyuck mutters, sounding mulish as he swats at his tablet to bring up the list they had just discussed.”

“It’s unlikely that there aren’t _more_ we’re missing, but I trust Donghyuck enough to be comfortable ordering a trace on the names we do have,” Jungwoo says, sounding more sure of himself and Taeyong relaxes a little.

“As Jungwoo has no doubt already informed you, Taeyong, her Majesty and the full Council Trifecta have signed off on this mission – recovering the two magical artefacts and stopping the WeiShen’s goal with them is of the utmost priority. You have been granted the authority to all Council resources and the Council will back your choices, but please have _some_ discretion.”

“Full authority? We don’t even have to play phone tag with you Han?” Johnny asks, sounding perky and Taeyong can practically see the moment Hansol tastes bile.

“I am to play your cleanup crew, as it seems, so you will need to advise me of your actions but no. you do not need _permission,”_ he admits and Johnny’s grin is blinding.

Taeyong just waits, feeling his own adrenaline built as he stares up at the list of names still projected up on the wall, and while one name in particular should be screaming out at him, burning down the back of his throat.

It’s not.

Instead, it’s a different name that Taeyong can’t look away from. But one still steeped in more history than he is willing to remember.

_Dong Sicheng._

“The first step is going to be intercepting this Wong Kunhang before he reaches Shanghai. Does anyone have any suggestions?” Hansol asks, sitting down on the corner of the lounge and wincing as it groans under the sudden new weight.

“We do have enough time if we can hitch a ride on a carrier to intercept ourselves,” Johnny says, gaze flickering between his phone and the rest of the room. “Shownu says there’s one leaving Barkston Heath in three hours; plenty of time.”

“That still doesn’t give us a way of intercepting them though – that just puts us on the ground in Shanghai,” Jungwoo replies and Johnny shrugs.

“it’s like still a ten hour flight, we’ve got time to figure that out in the air.”

“Jesus Christ this is why no one can work with you,” Hansol groans and Johnny just grins like that alone is the best compliment he’s ever received.

It is, in many ways.

Johnny and Taeyong both take incredible joy in being unfavourable to almost the entire Council.

Loyalty is hard won, after all.

“what if I had a way,” Taeyong says, finally and feels every pair of eyes on him immediately.

But it’s Hansol’s Taeyong looks to.

Hansol is the one who is going to balk.

But this will be the moment his words ring true. If Taeyong has truly been granted every authority, then even Hansol really cant turn him down. He’s asking permission when he shouldn’t even need it.

But it’s less about permission and more about courtesy, really.

Taeyong couldn’t imagine how it would feel if their places were reversed and Hansol just… showed up with him again.

Taeyong would probably shoot both of them.

But right now the ball is in Taeyong’s court and this choice is ultimately going to be his.

Hansol is about to figure that out the hard way.

“Jungwoo is right, we need a way to actually intercept the Weishen, without it we’re flying blind. They’re steps ahead of us and we need a guaranteed way of infiltrating their next moves. There’s only one person who can get us that in.”

Taeyong can see Hansol’s brain working overtime and he knows the moment their old friend comes to the same conclusion as Taeyong did nearly twenty minutes ago now.

“No,” Hansol says, definitively, shaking his head before Taeyong can speak up again, but it’s useless trying to deny it. It’s the simple truth.

There _is_ only one person who can get them into the WeiShen’s atmosphere and that is fact.

“I need someone who knows the WeiShen. Who knows how they work, how they move, how they think. I need Nakamoto Yuta.”

There is an immediate drawn breath from almost everyone around them and Taeyong just ignores it all. He has to.

“Not in your wildest dreams, Taeyong. Not if he was the last person on earth,” Hansol says, states, swears.

But that doesn’t change the fact that Taeyong needs him, and Taeyong has been granted the authority to get him.

And Hansol is going to need to be the one who gets him out.

“I need him. We need him,” Taeyong says, feeling Johnny’s gaze burning into the back of his head. He can feel how much Johnny hates this as well. It is absolutely the stupidest thing Taeyong has done in a while, and he _will_ pay for it. But with the key on the loose and the sundial missing Taeyong is two steps behind the WeiShen and he _doesn’t have a clue_ how to find out where they’re going next. Sure, they _could_ figure it out but they don’t have time. They need to catch up now while they have a slim clue of where even some of them might be. They need the WeiShen to even have a running chance, they _need_ an in, and there really isn’t anyone Taeyong can think of with better access than Yuta.

It’s always been Yuta.

“You know as well as I do that no one else is going to be able to get close. This is huge, Hansol. This is beyond anything we’ve played with before. Whoever Ten is actually working for, the WeiShen are just one part of it. They don’t have the bankroll for this; they’ve been too quiet to have the funds to even pay the bastards your kids are taking to the morgue. I’d bet anything they’re being used, but that doesn’t make them stupid. They’re not going to let just anyone close. _Yuta_ is the only one who can draw them out in the time we have. We need him.”

Taeyong can see the war play out in the tiny frustration lines around Hansol’s mouth. But he knows he has him, he knows that Hansol is going to give in, because he has to. He knows Taeyong wouldn’t ask unless there wasn’t any other way.

Taeyong wasn’t the only one Yuta hurt all those years ago.

He hurt Hansol too, he hurt all of them and the idea of letting him out is ridiculous, but he can’t think of any other way.

Yuta is Sicheng’s only weakness, and without Sicheng the WeiShen have nothing they can exploit in the time that they have. No one is going to be stupid enough to take any sort of bait except Sicheng. Taeyong has one point to put pressure on and he has to take it.

“He’s going to betray you; you know that right,” Hansol says, grimy.

Taeyong smiles. Small and sad.

“I know. But he’ll get me in. He’ll get me close and that’s all we need. Kim Doyoung knows more about this key than anyone else and I have no idea where he’s heading, not after they stole the Sundial from Greece. The only one who does is the WeiShen. I need him.”

“I know. Just. Be careful with what you’re about to do, Taeyong. It’s not just you who’s going to reap the consequences here.”

“I know. Hansol, _I know_. But we’re way behind here. Ten’s turned our playbook against us and we’re flying blind. I can’t do this without Yuta. You know I can’t.”

“Just… don’t die, alright? If you get yourself shot I’m the one who has to deal with Donghyuck here and if any of these kids are gonna give me a heart attack it’s definitely going to be him.”

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> I know its been quite a while since this fic has updated, and it's a lot of setup to get through but there's plenty more to come and it's about to get more exciting from here!  
> I hope you enjoy whats coming next!  
> MWAH  
> xxx  
> ps
> 
> If you'd like to chat I can be found on twitter and curious cat and i'm always open <3
> 
> [ @CaptainJacq](http://twitter.com/captainJacq)  
> [ Curious Cat](http://curiouscat.me/captainJacq)


	5. Chapter IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Taeyong visits Yuta.  
> It goes about as well as he's expecting.

** IV **

Taeyong has been to the Carriage Jail only once.

A long time has stretched out since then, and Taeyong has worked hard at forgetting the way he had felt leaving this place the last time he was here.

But perhaps what is worse is feeling as if no time has passed at all.

The betrayals feel fresh again and while there is an enormous amount to keep him distracted, Taeyong cannot help but feel the shadow of old friends lingering too close to home.

And he is not alone in feeling it.

There is a solemn air about the whole team from the moment they leave the estate, and the flight to Seoul itself is tinged in an uneasy boredom that makes even sleep uncomfortable.

Not that sleeping strapped into the noisy back of an RAF transport carrier was ever going to be pleasant.

But comparatively, the flight from Seoul to Jeju and the hidden Carriage is even worse.

“If you think I’m letting you go alone, you’re stupider than you look,” Johnny had said in their loungeroom sixteen hours before hand, and Taeyong is thankful for it beyond belief now that he’s here, walking through each security gate and feeling eyes on him from every angle.

It’s a horrible feeling, and the dread that had resurfaced when he’d started thinking about Yuta back in his own foyer doubles.

He would be lying if he ever tried to admit that he hadn’t thought about his two friends in the last few years. He would be lying if he tried to admit thinking about them both didn’t hurt. And yet now when he had believed the two of them far behind him, he finds himself facing both of them in quick succession.

It’s enough to give him whiplash, and as he glances back he flashes Johnny a gentle smile because he truly doesn’t know if he’d be capable of any of this bullshit without his big hulking lug of a best friend.

“Are you okay?” Johnny asks as they linger outside the final High Security Wing.

The walls here are glass and chrome and from their vantage on the other side they can see the entirety of a long corridor made out of time-burnished steel. Each prisoner is restricted to their own small cell, but if they ever made it out, all they would face is an echo chamber of bulletproof glass and a dozen other thick steel doors keeping them separate from each other.

Taeyong knows from experience that even sound feels distorted once they pass through the final checkpoint and he shivers involuntarily.

Johnny notices, Johnny _always_ notices.

“Yong?” he asks again, voice tempered and soft.

“As I’ll ever be,” Taeyong finally grits out and flashes Johnny a half smile as his friend cups the back of his neck in a familiar gesture that actually does far more to calm the racing of Taeyong’s heart than anything he could have possibly said.

Johnny probably knows that too.

“Ready?” Hansol says, turning back to face them and Taeyong nods, squeezing Johnny’s hand as he pries the warm weight off him.

Taeyong shivers as he steps through the scanner and into the sealed wing, waiting patiently for Johnny to follow behind him and then watch as the door swings shut and the three of them are sealed in.

It’s only a handful of steps but even the air pressure is different in the final security wing. It’s filtered in, and perfectly capable of being mixed with tear gas or some sort of sedative if ever needed. Just one more level of security in a prison that technically doesn’t exist to the general public.

“This way,” Hansol says, leading them up towards cell number 10 and disappears into the cramped security room wedged between the two cells either side.

Taeyong can still feel Hansol’s disapproval radiating off him in waves, but whatever irritation Johnny was feeling back in England has definitely given way more to concern than anything else.

Which sort of itches because Taeyong isn’t _weak_ , he’s not some delicate flower about to cry when he looks Yuta in the eyes again. But it still hurts, and it hurts more than he thought it would and he knows it’s mostly because he’s not just here to _see_ Yuta.

He’s here to let him out.

He’s here to let Yuta loose into the world again.

And it’s not something they should be doing. Yuta had made casualties out of more than just himself and Taeyong isn’t really expecting that to change. But this is necessary. It’s _needed._

“I’ll be in here, on the other side of that wall,” Johnny says, lingering in the doorway of the security room where he’s about to wait all this out, leaving Taeyong in the corridor alone standing outside Yuta’s door.

“I’ve got my eyes on you, TY,” Johnny says, the phrase familiar and warm and Taeyong feels almost instantly more sure of himself.

He hates that this is what they’re here for. In this moment he wishes nothing more than he was here to let Yuta out for the right reasons and that he could expect more than just the worst.

But there’s no time for that.

There’s only time for Ten and the key and whatever havoc the WeiShen are about to unleash if they’re not stopped in time.

So.

He takes a deep breath, squares his shoulders and waves to be let in.

The door shrieks as it opens but Yuta doesn’t budge from where he’s laid out on his bed until the door slams shut behind Taeyong. It’s only then that he even turns his head, in a dramatic flop, and then grins, like he’s only just seeing who is standing in his doorway.

Taeyong lets him have his façade and waits him out as Yuta climbs to his feet like a cat stretching out his limbs.

“Well I’ll be goddamned,” Yuta says, standing tall and proud in the orange jumpsuit he’s wearing low-slung around his waist, his arms bare in the off white tank and mouth-wateringly defined.

He is almost exactly how Taeyong remembers him, and exactly nothing alike at the same time. The most poignant thing is perhaps the way he’s a little twitchier than Taeyong remembers, the way a dog gets when kept inside too long.

His dark hair is much longer than the last time they met and his bone structure is sharper with age, but it doesn’t do anything to change how impossibly handsome he is. Yuta seems timeless, and Taeyong’s heart makes a sudden pang for everything that they lost.

Once upon a time he would have given everything to see Yuta smile.

“Looking good, Taeyongie,” Yuta grins, that familiar expression just as bright and heartbreaking as it has always been.

Taeyong makes a desperate bid to shut down the wisp-like feelings drifting up from past memories that are making him soften.

“What, no smile for an old friend?”

“I’d hardly call our last catchup means for a happy reunion,” Taeyong replies before he can stop himself. Yuta throws his head back with a cackle that defies all of Taeyong’s determination to hold his feelings back.

The sound echoes and aches and Taeyong feels young and vulnerable again.

“Ah yes, that last bid to make me repent. Here for a round two?”

“No.”

“Oho, excellent. What _are_ we here for then?” Yuta asks greedily.

“Work.”

“Boring.” 

“Has to be better than here,” Taeyong says, eyeing the endless grey from floor to ceiling. Yuta shrugs.

“And to think I cleaned up when I heard you were coming. Besides, I like mountains and all, but I also like running water and dirty magazines. Your temples don’t usually have those.” Yuta shrugs, though still peeking up at Taeyong through his lashes glibly. Desperate to see Taeyong’s reaction to knowing more than he should.

Taeyong doesn’t take the bait no matter how much he wants to.

Yuta has always known more than he should, it’s what he did back then. Its why all this went to shit in the first place all those years ago, and Yuta ended up here, with a Soul mark across his collar bones and a tracking chip under his skin.

He shouldn’t technically know what Taeyong does now. He shouldn’t know about the expeditions and the tombs and Taeyong’s growing vault of ancient artefacts the Centre don’t necessarily need to keep locked up below Cambridge University.

Or have room for.

But Yuta has always known things he shouldn’t.

For nearly a decade Taeyong had been the ambidextrous front line while Yuta had been the informatative right hand man. Yuta’s espionage skills are what had set him apart from most of the group, his silver tongue and glib personality.

He had contacts everywhere, eyes and ears and whispers where everyone had only silence.

Taeyong isn’t surprised Yuta knows. He wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if Yuta knows _everything_ already. About Ten, about the Weishen, about Taeyong.

It’s why he’s here. Or at least partially.

“So, why are you here, bubbles?”

“Yesterday Ten showed up after nearly three years off the grid. He took something that belongs to me. I need it back.”

“And what do you need me to do, exactly?” Yuta asks, eyebrow quirked with condescension.

“Find me the WeishenV.”

Yuta’s eyes narrow and Taeyong watches the gears turn in Yuta’s brain, watches the scenarios and threads intertwine as they play out.

“You know what that means, TY.”

“I do.”

“And Hansol let you do this?”

“He’s right outside.”

“Bullshit,” Yuta replies immediately, but there is an excited sort of glimmer in his eyes now that Taeyong can’t ignore. Yuta is curious, has _always_ been curious, it has been his sharpest skill and his greatest weakness and Taeyong is offering just enough to make him wonder, make him guess and that is half the battle won.

“Believe what you want. You get nothing more until you agree,” he shrugs.

“What’s to stop me from disappearing the moment you let me out of here?” Yuta probes and this, this is where he gets him. Because as much as Taeyong wishes he could coax him back with his curiosity alone, Yuta is too smart to give himself away for free.

Taeyong wouldn’t be here unless he had to be.

 _Hansol_ wouldn’t be here unless they were dire.

“There is a royal pardon waiting, ensuring your freedom and return to the United Kingdom and five million sterling sitting in a bank account waiting for your name on it.”

Yuta snorts, clearly amused.

“Don’t be asinine, what do you have that’s _worth_ anything, Taeyong? A pardon? You know I don’t need it, and money is _nothing_. We both know that. Money is easy. What else do you have that will make this worth it?”

Taeyong smiles, hollow and hard. He hates this, he hates himself for _this_ more than perhaps anything.

But they’re desperate, and the boy understands. Taeyong made sure he did before he even truly considered putting this on the table. 

But this secret is the only thing Taeyong has that he knows will make Yuta work for him with even a shred of authenticity. Yuta’s only priority is going to be Sicheng. There’s only one thing Taeyong has that can trump that.

Seven years ago he made a decision that changed a little boy’s life, and he has done everything he can to ensure that doesn’t change. And here and now he’s going to have to tear it apart himself.

He says it anyway.

“I know where Chenle is.”

“ _What did you say_?”

Yuta’s expression flickers and falters and crumbles in a millisecond and his bravado struggles to pull himself back together at all. Taeyong just has to stand there and watch it.

The look on Yuta’s face is an earth-shattering memory that Taeyong never thought he would ever see again. The Yuta from seven years ago, young and cocky and terrified just like the rest of them. Children at play with the world at their fingertips.

“Fulfil your half of the bargain and you’re free to disappear,” Taeyong says, carrying on as if he hasn’t changed everything. He opens the groove in his jacket and slips the photograph out.

It’s old, nearly five years old and Chenle has lost most of the baby face since then, gods he’s nearly seventeen and getting impossibly handsome by the day. He’s nearly twice the height now as he was in the photograph and determined to keep his hair blonde no matter how fast his roots grow out.

But the Chenle in the picture is enough to prove what Taeyong is saying. That Chenle _is_ alive, despite what Yuta and Sicheng and the Zhong family believe. Because Yuta never saw Chenle reach ten. Nobody thought that little boy lived long enough to reach his birthday, and yet in the picture Taeyong is holding out Chenle is twelve, nearly thirteen and that small stretch of time is all that Taeyong can cling to as he fights some desperate hope to protect him.

All while offering him up on a plate.

He hates it. Hates himself. But Chenle understands and that is the only reason why Taeyong has let himself do this.

He doesn’t let Yuta take the picture, determined still to keep the boy firmyl out of Yuta’s reach, pushing the picture back into his hidden pocket and locking it away again.

Yuta still looks a little sick, face pale and expression lost.

“Fulfil your half of the bargain without betraying me and I’ll let you speak to him,” Taeyong says around the lump in his throat.

“That’s not funny, Taeyong,” Yuta croaks and Taeyong steadies himself, squares his shoulders and takes a breath.

“It’s not. But it is the truth. Chenle is alive.”

“How?”

“That’s none of your concern.”

“Of course it is! I was meant to protect him!” Yuta growls, furious. But his indignation digs nails into old wounds Taeyong hasn’t quite closed over yet.

“Yes, you were!” Taeyong says, snaps, _snarls_. Old anger bubbling under his skin and burning away his composure. “And you didn’t, Yuta! You and Sicheng nearly cost a little boy his _life_ when you were meant to keep him safe. Instead you were so wound up in each other you were blind to everything around you. Be content knowing that he’s alive. Do your job. Help me find the WeiShen. Help me get back what they stole and I’ll let you talk to him. No more.”

“You’re a bastard, Lee Taeyong.”

“And you’re a traitor. Out of the two of us I’m not the one rotting away in a _jail cell_.”

Yuta falls quiet and Taeyong lets him, watching carefully as the emotions crawl over his old friends face one by one before he shuts them down. He settles on a hard frown and with a breath he nods.

“I’m in,” he says.

“Good,” Taeyong replies, turning to look up at the camera. The door bolt unlocks and swings open and Taeyong leaves without a second glance.

There will be _plenty_ more time to wallow in old regrets later.

*

“That went well.”

Hansol is angry.

Hansol is angry at Taeyong’s decisions. Taeyong’s mistakes. 

Hansol is _always_ angry at Taeyong’s mistakes.

“Shut up, Ji,” Johnny says for him and Taeyong huffs, striding further up the security corridor and Hansol lets him go.

Johnny does not.

“Are you okay?” Johnny asks, using his sheer bulk to hide Taeyong almost entirely from the rest of the hallway and despite the fact Hansol and the half a dozen cameras are the only eyes on them, Taeyong appreciates it all the same.

“Yeah. Yeah, I am. I will be. What about you?” he asks, peering up at Johnny through his lashes. Johnny makes a face.

“I didn’t think I ever wanted to see him again. Not after what happened. I don’t like it, Yongie. I gotta be honest. But you were right about needing him. No one else can help with this except him.”

“That’s even if Sicheng wants to see him.”

“He will," Johnny says with a certainty that Taeyong doesn't feel all of a sudden.

“How can you be so sure?”

“He’s still alive. If Sicheng was done with him they would have gotten rid of him years ago.”

“He’s been in maximum security. In _Korea._ ”

“And Sicheng can fold himself into a box,” Johnny shrugs.

Taeyong snorts in surprise and Johnny looks improbably proud of himself.

“Look, what happened with Sicheng was a shitshow, but he never held any of it against Yuta. He can’t. They're soul mates. Sicheng is going to know the moment Yuta sets foot on Chinese soil again, and he’s gonna be on him like a fly on ointment. We wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

Taeyong's stomach lurches as Johnny says back every thought he's had between the estate and this hellhole of a prison. But the truth still hurts. It will always hurt and Taeyong will always be blind to it in ways Johnny never will be.

Because Johnny has Jaehyun. He has his soul mate; the same way Yuta has Sicheng.

And Taeyong has no one.

“You’re right. I know,” Taeyong murmurs, glancing at the steel door where in the next few minutes Yuta is going to be fitted for his tracking anklet. It’s not going to mean much, Yuta’s going to get out of it in the next twelve hours _max_ , but the Centre won’t release him without it.

And frankly Taeyong is relying on that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> This fic has taken a lot of setting up, but we're finally into the fun stuff!   
> Action! adventure! Angst! A lot of making out!   
> until next time  
> MWAH  
> xxx  
> ps
> 
> If you'd like to chat I can be found on twitter and curious cat and i'm always open <3
> 
> [ @CaptainJacq](http://twitter.com/captainJacq)  
> [ Curious Cat](http://curiouscat.me/captainJacq)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> I hope this is a fun read and i cant wait to see what you all think!  
> If you'd like to chat I can be found on twitter and curious cat. I have loved writing this story a LOT and i would love to hear your thoughts. 
> 
> [ @CaptainJacq](http://twitter.com/captainJacq)
> 
> [ Curious Cat"](Http://curiouscat.me/CaptainJacq)
> 
> Until next time  
> MWAH  
> xxxx


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